PT stuff

Sorry for the delay with the updates!
Some PT stuff:
Fanny, the young woman with the fractured hip is scheduled to have surgery October 18th! Right now, we are continuing to work on strengthening, balance, and endurance (especially in regards to safely walking longer distances with the crutches). I'm able to see her 2-4 times every week and she has been doing a lot on her own as well. And her new baby is growing so fast; she's two months old now and has the biggest eyes. It is so easy to make her smile and she always watches me when I am there.. It's been a really cool experience for me getting to know Fanny and her family; because I see Fanny at her house I'm able to spend time with her kids as well and get a better idea of what their life is like. Definatley gives me an idea of what Home Health PT is like. And Fanny's two year old son Pablito is adorable! Normally I have no idea what he is saying and half the time I think he is scared of me but the other half of the time he takes me around their house and takes me to the fruit trees in their backyard. The other day when I was there he had his mom help him take off his shirt, said he wanted to take a bath and then ran out the back door. The next thing we know he comes running back in butt naked and soaking wet and laughing....apparently he'd jumped under the shower for a minute and then he said he wanted to go down to the stream to bath with the baby ducks (actually I had no idea what he was saying but after about 5 minutes of explaining from Fanny and her mom I finally understood).

In the last two weeks I also have spent time working with a seven year old girl. She broke her arm (distal humerus) in April, had two screws put in, and was immobilized in a cast in elbow flexion for two months. After the cast was removed her elbow was stuck at about a 65 degree flexion angle. She then had an injection and manipulation performed; that enabled her to move to about a 90 degree angle but she still only had about 10 degrees of motion. I worked with her and her mom for about two weeks teaching them stretching and active range of motion exercises as well as performing some mobilizations. She gained about 10-15 degrees of motion but still can only actively move about 20 degrees. I think that she would benefit from a dynamic splint but I don't know if we are going to be able to get her one. In the meantime her mom was educated on the need to stretch her elbow multiple times a day for increased amounts of time. She is actually related to Fanny as well (I think everyone in Palacios is related somehow) and it worked out well because at times I would go see her in her house after seeing Fanny; again it was really cool to be able to visit them in their homes and see more of the community.

There is also a young boy who I think has CP, spastic quadriplegia. His mom and he were supposed to come to the clinic today but for some reason they couldn't. I am going to try to visit them in the next several weeks and hopefully talk to the social worker about getting him a better wheelchair.

And during the clinic day I am seeing many patients with adhesive capsulitis, chronic back pain, chronic shoulder pain, chronic pain all over their body! I need your skills Tricia! I'm still trying to figure out the best way to see patients at the clinic; it's tough to know if I should get the patients that look like they need therapy before they see the doctor or wait until they finish with the doctor and have the doctors send them to me....so some days I'm pretty busy and other days I don't really have any patients to see.