#329 Pediatric NDT Intensive Handling Intervention... Course Developed by Gail Ritchie

#329 Pediatric NDT Intensive Handling Intervention... Course Developed by Gail Ritchie is organized by MotivationsCEU and will be held from Oct 23 - 24, 2026 at La Rabida Children’s Hospital, Chicago, Illinois, United States of America.

Description:
As clinicians treating individuals with central nervous system dysfunction, such as cerebral palsy, congenital hypotonia and other multi-system impairments, we can make advances in our clinical decision making skills by establishing hypotheses regarding the critical impairments that we observe in our assessments and be more precise in our treatment sessions. This 2-day, hands-on lab intensive seminar is designed to further enhance the ability to treat individual’s with CNS dysfunction. We will briefly review the current Neuro-Developmental Treatment Approach principles and rationales that support our treatment planning and the strategies used within a treatment session. Development of your handling skills will be emphasized as a way to influence multi-system and single system impairments related to the clients’s functional outcomes. Development of specific handling skills related to in-effective posture and movement behaviors observed in the neurologically challenged client will be the primary focus of this seminar.

Discussion of therapeutic intervention and the clinical decision-making process will be discussed. A combination of didactic, video examples, laboratory learning experiences and patient demonstration will ensure the integration of NDT as a foundation for intervention.

Objectives:
Upon completion of this course, the participant will be able to:

1. Demonstrate the ability to use graded sensory input to influence posture and movement for a given individual with a neuromuscular impairment for participation in ADL’s.
2. Prioritize 3 intervention strategies after identifying the relationship between functional limitations, multi-system impairments, and single system impairments.
3. Justify a treatment strategy using at least 3 interventions discussed in this course for a given neuromuscular impairment, to improve range of motion for function in 3 planes of movement, approach, reach and grasp for upper and lower body dressing.
4. Effectively apply sustained and intermittent touch with varying pressures in conjunction with movement, joint compression, or traction, to facilitate antigravity postural control during therapeutic transitions.
5. Identify and apply three treatment strategies that effectively improve establishing a base of support, alignment, muscle activation, and functional outcomes in clients with neuromuscular impairments during play activities.