My 11mo dd needs PT for low muscle tone. Anyone else deal with this?

[KIN]

Did physical therapy help your child? Did the child have any other delays? What caused the low muscle tone?

 

I called our local First Steps b/c my dd isn't able to get herself to sitting, isn't crawling, or pulling up. She rolls to get from place to place. So, PT and OT came out to evaluate her and said she does qualify for PT because of her delay. They said she has low muscle tone. I'm glad she will be able to get the help she needs, but worried about what it means for the future.

 

What is your story with low muscle tone?

[RoughCollie]

My son was in the same situation at 11 months old. He had already been receiving PT, but it hadn't helped that I could see, and there was a reason.

 

My Mom came to visit when DS was 13 mos. old and his condition was unchanged. She suggested he may have a vision problem. Sure enough, that's what it was. He got glasses, could see to balance, and within a month was sitting up and crawling.

 

Now, why it took Grandma to discover this when we had a PT, an OT, a pediatrician we saw every month, etc., I don't know. I think all those professionals just assumed his problems were due to prematurity and did not think.

 

My DS was born 3 months early and had retinopathy of prematurity, so poor vision may not apply in your case.

[cin]

My dd was adopted at 11.5 mos. She was malnourished and had had 6 or 8 broken bones (I can't remember). She had low muscle tone. She didn't walk until she was 18 mos, and she crawled at about 16 mos. She is fine now. We got a PT eval at 12 mos, they gave us some exercises, we did them, and at 18 mos, she was fine (relatively speaking :lol:)

[Aunty Social]

My son was diagnosed with speech delay, torticollis (sp?) and low muscle tone. He also had eye problems that required a couple surgeries.

 

He had several other "worrisome behaviors" but was never diagnosed with anything else.

 

He went to pt for about 18 m or so, and on the therapists recommendation we started gymnastics as well (mommy and me at first, now he's on his own). He'll probably drop gymnastics after this year because he's starting to lose interest in it, and he doesn't need it anymore for therapy.

 

Low muscle tone sounds scary, but (at least in our case) seems to be relatively easy to address. Some kids do need to be on pt longer though. I think it depends on how "low" they are.

[Quiver0f10]

My 15 yo had this as an baby too. He was late to crawl and when he would crawl, his arms and legs would just give out and he'd flop onto his belly. He was one of my latest to walk, too. He did PT for a while and it did help some, but even today he isn't as strong as his brothers and is very clumsy.