If your child is currently receiving physical therapy or if you’re just learning about it-here are the top 5 most common questions I receive.

5. Why is it important for my child to crawl before he walks?

People will often say, “Oh, they’ll walk before they crawl”, but we actually want to flip this as much as possible. Crawling is an important part of developing and has several benefits that your child can’t develop as easily without it. Crawling on hands and knees builds great arm and shoulder strength. This contributes to hand strength for better handwriting as a child grows. It also incorporates some natural reflexes that otherwise could make tasks harder such as being able to move forward without your child bending their head towards their chest each time. The reciprocal pattern of moving arms and legs opposite actually helps teach your child’s brain how to process information from side to side. This later can translate into an easier ability to read. Typically, children crawl 5 football lengths in a single day! That’s a lot of time to practice and develop strength that a child would miss out on if they skip to walking.

4. Is it important to practice at home in between sessions?

Practicing the exercises or skills that your physical therapist asks you to do at home is extremely important. Your physical therapist sees your child one or two times a week for at most an hour at a time. Meanwhile, you spend significantly more time than that with your child. Physical therapists teach yourself and your child new skills in those short hours throughout the week, but the work that makes the new skill a habit and easy for your child comes from practicing throughout the week. They say it takes 10,000 hours to become an expert and there’s no better place to get started than at home in your daily routine. 

3. Why does my child toe walk?

There are several different reasons why a child might walk on their tip toes. Sometimes, kids do it because they are excited and need a way to demonstrate that excitement and energy. Sometimes kids do it because they might be bored or they’ve learned this is a new skill that they can explore. If your child only toe walks occasionally, there is typically no need for a physical therapy evaluation unless you have other concerns as well.

When a child walks on their toes consistently; it doesn’t matter how often you say “walk with flat feet”, there’s no change depending on the environment or type of shoes or their emotions, then your child would probably benefit from a physical therapy evaluation. The most common reasons a child would walk on their toes constantly would be tight gastrocnemius muscles, also known as your calf muscles. When that muscle is tight, it makes it difficult for children to dorsiflex or bring their toe up towards the top of their head.

2. When do I need to get a physical therapy evaluation?

Physical therapy addresses gross motor movement. For children, this is often skills such as: 

• Walking
• Running
• Going up/down stairs
• Jumping
• Balance
• Catching/throwing a ball
• Kicking

If you have any concerns that your child is not doing these skills at all or not well for their age, a physical therapy evaluation could be beneficial. Most insurances and doctors require you to go to your primary care physician first to receive a physical therapy referral. However, if you are unsure, you can call us at 859-353-3666 to schedule a screening. A screening is a hands-off evaluation to determine if a child needs a more thorough evaluation. 

1.How long does physical therapy take?

This is the number one question we get as physical therapists. The answer to this popular question is: it depends. I don’t like to answer with a time period because children are always changing and they could learn new skills faster or slower than we expect. How fast they learn skills depends on things like, how often do you and your child practice the new skills they have learned, how difficult is the task your child is learning, and how many skills we want to work on. The rule of thumb though is that the more often a skill is practiced at home, outside of physical therapy, the faster the child masters the skill and the less time is required at physical therapy.

If your question isn’t answered here or you would like more information, please call us at 859-353-3666 with your question. We will be happy to answer you to the best of our ability. 

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