Signs and symptoms of developmental delay

 Do your children show delay to walk? Or do you become scared about the developmental delay of your child? No worries, it is common to many children in their childhood.

Some development problems can be solved by aging, but many others should need treatment to develop the skills.

Moreover, hereditary and genetic problems can also cause developmental delay. To find the root cause and then start the treatment will be more effective and a good occupational therapist can find and treat the developmental problems.

This developmental delay is also known as developmental disability where both have the same meaning. 

Early treatment can simply improve the development issues. There are different types of development problems that can be completely cured and also those cannot be cured.

Some contributions to this disability can occur before a child is born, during the birth process, and after birth. Many reasons cause developmental delay and they are:

• Some genetic or hereditary conditions like Down syndrome

• Metabolic disorders like phenylketonuria (PKU)

• Trauma to the brain, for example, shaken baby syndrome

• Serious psychosocial trauma, like post-traumatic stress disorder

• Exposure to certain toxic substances as prenatal alcohol exposure or lead poisoning

• Some critical infections

• Deprivation of food or environment

There are some signs and symptoms that show developmental delay in children. Some of the signs can be identified and some others cannot be noticed during infancy.

The symptoms that are most common in the development problems are:

• Delay in the development of learning 

• Delay to rolling over, sitting up, crawling, or walking

• Difficulty in communicating or socializing with others

• Lower than average scores on IQ tests

• Difficulties in speech or talking late

• Low memory

• Inability to connect actions with consequences

• Difficulty with problem-solving or logical thinking

• Trouble to learn

• Disability to do daily routine tasks like getting dressed or using the restroom without help

 

These problems can be solved by providing proper treatment to your child. Occupational Therapy in Ras Al Khaimah offers the best and effective treatment for the wellness of your children.

Moreover, the occupational therapy treatment and methods vary according to the stage of your children.

Therefore, it is easy to cure if the treatment starts at the earliest and makes your children more confident in their lives.

How occupational therapies transform lives in children?

 Learning skills and other developmental skills are different for different children. Developmental delays during their infancy are common. Moreover, some children take more time to walk or learn than other children of the same age.

The role of parents during these situations are inevitable. It is essential to consult a  doctor or a therapist to identify the developmental problems in the toddlers. 

A good occupational therapist can find and treat effectively using different therapy sessions. Differently-abled children have some other special skills than normal children.

There are several sessions in occupational therapy that are used in different stages. In addition to these therapy sessions, the therapist also checks the physical and mental fitness. 

Some of the sessions used in the occupational therapy sessions are:

• Therapeutic Activities

• Activities of daily living

• Orthosis/splinting

• Prosthesis

• Wheelchairs and wheelchair transfers

• Biofeedback as an adjunct therapy

• Movement Therapy

• Neurodevelopmental treatment – Bobath approach

• The Proprioceptive Neuromuscular Facilitation (PNF) approach

Each of the sessions is decided according to the medical stage of children, and these stages are decided using certain measuring devices and techniques. 

Some of them are listed below:

• SPIROMETERS

• MEDICAL SCREENINGS

• PHYSICAL ACTIVITY

• HOME VISITS

•  LIFE CHANGES AND ADAPTATIONS

• PATIENT-CENTERED CARE

The ultimate aim of every occupational therapist is to transform the disabilities into abilities. Occupational Therapy in Ras Al Khaimah helps to provide the best therapy sessions and relevant medications to build physical and emotional fitness as well as social abilities.

These effective treatments can cure most of the difficulties of infants and toddlers that can make transformations.

Symptoms of handwriting difficulties

 The handwriting of the children is unique and varies while they grow. Teachers are the experts who help them to improve their handwriting from pre-school, and teachers arrange a time slot to write in a cursive writing book and also teach them to pronounce the same sentence in the exact accent. Dysgraphia is the medical name of handwriting difficulties in children and adults. 

Some children will not cope-up with the handwriting techniques, and they face difficulties writing certain letters.

Parents can identify this problem from childhood and can start treatment with the help of an occupational therapist. Occupational Therapy in Ras Al Khaimah has the expertise in handling these types of difficulties and bringing up the children to become confident in writing.

Parents can also identify the handwriting problems from childhood itself. Dysgraphia can also happen in adults due to brain injury.

However, the researchers are not sure about the reason for this problem in children. Here are some symptoms that are used for the identification of dysgraphia: 

• Cramped grip, which may lead to holding a pen or pencil

• Difficulty spacing things on paper or poor spatial planning

• Frequent erasing or striking

• Inconsistency in letters and words spacing

• Poor spelling, including incomplete words or missing words or letters

• Unusual wrist, body, or paper position while writing

 

The Best rehabilitation center in Ras Al Khaimah has different methods and techniques which are super effective for children who are weak in writing skills or having writing difficulties.

In addition to that, the involvement of parents and the freedom to express their thoughts and feelings to a paper will also make some improvements.

Sometimes, this process will take time, but the outcome will be the best. 

How to improve the social interaction skills in children?

Social interaction is an essential part of life, where parents need to teach their children about its importance from early childhood.

A good percentage of children do not like to interact with others, and there are many reasons for this problem.

For instance, unlimited use of smartphones and video games are some of them. However, some children are facing difficulties to improve their social skills. 

Rehabilitation center Dubai can help children who struggle with social skills using different therapy services. The therapists use various therapy methods for effective treatment.

There are several steps that parents can involve in their child’s skill development process. This support can implicitly teach children about the value of love and compassion.

An expert therapist advises the parents to support their children and the importance of encouraging children to overcome their developmental problems.

Here are some of the tips that can improve the social interaction skills of children.

• Follow their interests.

• Practice role-playing.

• Teach empathy.

• Know your child’s strengths and weaknesses.

• Be a good listener.

• Give freedom to express their feelings.

Some children like to lead an introverted life, and some others are active in society.

The best rehabilitation center in Ras Al Khaimah makes an effort to treat the children using special therapy sessions, and this contains various levels of occupational therapies and speech therapies. Quality therapies can improve social skills as well as interactive skills.

Types of Dysgraphia

Dysgraphia (“Dys” meaning “difficulty” and “graphia” meaning “writing”) is a neurological disorder seen in many children with fine motor or sensory-motor challenges making their handwriting unintelligible.

Dysgraphia can result from any neurological trauma or along with physical impairments, ADHD, learning disabilities, autism etc. If the child shows symptoms of dysgraphia when introduced to writing, parents must consult the best occupational therapist for treatment.

Here are the types of dysgraphia:

Dyslexic Dysgraphia – When the child’s readily written works are illegible and copied works are fine with minor spelling mistakes, the condition is said to be dyslexic dysgraphia. It is not necessary that a child with dysgraphia must have dyslexia; they often occur together, but not certainly. 

Motor Dysgraphia – If the handwriting issues are caused by the deficiency of fine motor skills, poor dexterity, poor muscle tone etc. it becomes motor dysgraphia. Written works are illegible, even if copied from another document. For these children, letter formation requires extreme effort and considerable time, at the same time, cannot be sustained for a longer period of time.

Spatial Dysgraphia – When children find difficulty in understanding the space such as spacing between words, letters and lines on a sheet of paper, it is called spatial dysgraphia. These children write on top of the lines with no spatial concerns making the written works extremely hard to understand. They might not have any spelling errors or writing speed related issues but are unable to comprehend the concept of spacing. 

Phonological Dysgraphia – Phonological dysgraphia can be defined as the writing and spelling perplexities occurring with the spelling of unfamiliar words, non-words, and phonetically irregular words. Children with phonological dysgraphia have difficulty in memorizing phonemes to produce the right words. 

Lexical Dysgraphia – Lexical Dysgraphia is very rare, yet defined as a condition in which the child is able to spell words but hugely relay on standard sound-to-letter patterns which leads to the misspelling of words.

Dysgraphia can be diagnosed and corrected in the best occupational therapy center in Dubai. Although dysgraphia is of varying types, it is not necessary to know the correct type to begin the treatment. Most of the types require the same techniques and practices to cure the disorder.

Why does your child need Audio-Verbal Therapy?

Children with hearing impairment gain listening ability through hearing aids or cochlear implantation. Once their hearing loss is rectified with hearing aids, it is necessary that children must undergo audio-verbal therapy in any of the best speech therapy centers in UAE. Why is it a necessity? There are reasons to say so. 

• With the help of hearing aids, children can hear and detect most of the speech words addressed directly to them and the other sounds heard in the background. 

• It is not essential that a hearing-impaired child must become a visual learner, using sign language forever. With proper exposure and regular practice with speech therapists, one can become an auditory learner.

• With the improvement in auditory skills and verbal language, reading skills get enhancement alongside. 

• Parents of the children in AVT therapy need not worry about learning sign language, as the therapists aim to facilitate an audio-verbal conversation with the children without pushing into sign language. 

• Speech therapists create a supportive environment around the children, persuading them to listen carefully in constant interactions with fellow mates and therapists. 

• AVT sessions are highly effective in helping children to become independent in life so that their educational and social life goes smoothly, without much pressure and stress of being isolated by others. 

A child with hearing loss must never be pushed into the edge of sign language. Try the best speech therapist in UAE to help them learn conversational skills. If not, they will remain expressing their thoughts in actions, attend special schools and be stuck with the sign language forever. Let their life become more lively with dynamic words. 

Understanding Lisp in Speech Therapy

 What is Lisp?

A lisp can be explained as a speech impediment that usually involves the substitution of “s” and “z” sounds in common speech. Due to which lots of words go wrong ineffective communication. 

There are various types of lisp depending on the mouth organs that are involved in the production of the sounds. It can be modified with good speech therapy sessions. 

One cannot determine the actual time needed to overcome the issue, but studies have proven that almost 1/3rd of children show significant improvement within one year of regular speech therapy. 

Types of Lisp

There are four common types of lisps and they are:

• Interdental lisps

This kind of lisp occurs when the tongue goes between your front teeth and makes

the “th”- sound instead of the /s/ and /z/ sounds.

• Dentalized lisps

Dentalized lisps occur when the tongue hits the front teeth while making the /s/ and /z/ sounds,

making it unclear. 

• Lateral lisp

When /s/ and /z/ sounds are produced, the air escapes out through the sides of the tongue.

• Palatal lisp

In here, the child is trying to make the “s” sounds when the middle of the tongue is in contact

with the soft palate making it a palatal lisp.

The best speech therapy centers in Dubai, conduct a detailed assessment to identify the speech disorder of the child along with the kind of lisp category. 

Therapists also give a thorough check into the oral structure and mobility of the organs and cavity muscles.

After this customized, personal therapy methods are made to address the problem of each individual child. 

Never avoid consulting a pediatric speech therapist with the mentality that these speech errors with “grow out of it” over time.

It may not, it will only lead to further communication difficulties in the future.