Physio Assesment Miss L

So last week we had the physio come out and do a lower limb assessment on Miss L. With her Ehlers-Danlos and low tone she has 2 factors working against her. With the loose joints she moves in more diretions than she should and low tone means her muscles can't help stabilize her. She has been walking over a year now and isn't steady on her feet and still falls regularly. The problem with all those falls is the EDS (Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome) means her skin is slow to heal and scars easily. So we want to avoid the falls in the first place.

Today the physio wanted to check her range of movement and also her walking style.
We started with measuring the angle or range of movement in her feet, knees and hips. Miss L being fluent around doctors decided to try it herself on a teddy.

 

 

 After we checked the range of her feet (her toes nearly went backwards to her shins) then we did her hips and tunred them out to the ground. She was great during this bit as long as she held the ruler in between and got to play Dr. Then we moved on to see how her strength was coming along particularly her core strength. We started in clothes but took them off to see if she was using her abs or relying on other muscles.

On the ball she had to balance and then reach up. Using her obliques and reaching to the side proved hardest. Her balance was poor and as you can see with her left hand she kept holding onto something.

We tried to get her to put her legs on the ball and pull up her bottom but that was a fail. Not even enough strength to lift up her bottom while balancing her feet. Something that looked so simple but was obviously hard work for L.

Next step was to try some funny crawling exercises to mobilise her core and so we did frog leaps and crawling then we tried crab crawls. Tummy in the air using her arms and legs. All went well until the physio and I saw her arm was locked but her elbow started to slip out of joint. In the top picture you can just see it start to go when we both dropped camers and ran to her. Her arm was locked straight up and down but the actual elbow started to poke out as if it couldn't handle the force. Not a good one to practice.....

So at the end of the hour the physio said she will send the measurements and photos off to the orthotics specialists and see what they want to do. She definetly needs extra support and exercises alone may not be enough.