Physio for adults with Cerebral Palsy

Wanderlust Therapy for kids have extensive experience of assessing and treating children and young adults with Cerebral Palsy. We are passionate about providing an ongoing specialist neurological physiotherapy service to everyone who has Cerebral Palsy.
When children with Cerebral Palsy transition into adult services there is a reduction in therapy and a lack of access to highly skilled healthcare practitioners that understand the impact Cerebral Palsy can have on the adult body.
Cerebral Palsy muscle is different and the impact that Cerebral Palsy can have on the developing musculoskeletal system throughout childhood is important to understand. We can assess this during an initial assessment to understand your Cerebral Palsy as everyone is unique.
As adults with Cerebral Palsy age they should be regularly reviewed by specialist doctors and therapists. It is important that adults with Cerebral Palsy get this specialist interdisciplinary service to ensure each adult with Cerebral Palsy lives a full and active life as possible.
This has led us to offer services specifically to adults with Cerebral Palsy.

We can offer the following:

Initial physiotherapy Assessment

The assessment will include:
  • Observing your posture and movements 
  • Assessing your motor skills, balance, and coordination 
  • Analysis of your gait (walking pattern)
  • Selective motor control
  • Joint motion
  • Bony alignment / torsion
  • Neurological / tone assessment
  • Pain assessment

Bespoke Treatment Sessions:

We may recommend a block of one to one physiotherapy sessions and discuss with you specific functional goals.
Specific treatments and further assessments may include:
  • Strengthening exercises
  • Proprioceptive and balance activities
  • Sustained stretching exercises
  • Pool based exercise
  • Gym based exercise
  • Treatments to reduce pain and discomfort
  • Facilitation techniques and mobilisations
Following your assessment and with your consent:
We will gather information about the current team helping you such as other NHS therapists and doctors.
We may need to discuss our clinical findings, goals and treatment plan with members of this team to ensure good communication, teamwork and gold standard care. We may also suggest onward referrals if we feel you would benefit from further assessment with a specialist.

We also offer:

Equipment Assessment:

We are also specialists in therapy equipment and are very happy to advise you and make recommendations. We can also look at any functional difficulties you make have with your home/work environment and find ways to improve things.

Gait Analysis for adults with Cerebral Palsy

We use Dartfish to video your walking from the front and the side, both barefoot and with any current orthotics. We like using video analysis as we can slow the video down to help us understand what part of walking you are finding difficult. Alongside a thorough clinical assessment we can use this analysis to help with recommendations for orthotic prescriptions and bespoke strengthening and stretching (prolonged) to improve gait (walking pattern).

Outcome Measures:

We may also advise completion of one or several outcome measures to help monitor progress which will help measure the effectiveness of physiotherapy.

Cerebral palsy Resources:

Please refer to adult Cerebral Palsy hub for support and guidance. Adult Cerebral Palsy Hub aim to create, foster and give a much-needed voice to adults living with Cerebral Palsy and raise the profile of the large but currently underrepresented community of adults with CP.
Please refer to the National Institute of Health and Care Excellence (NICE) NICE Guideline Cerebral Palsy in adults – January 2019