The impact of proper seating and positioning on a child in a wheelchair can have dramatic results. However, many children have complex orthopedic and neuromuscular conditions that change over time and demand seating systems that meet their needs this morning, tonight and next year.

These goals are consistent among the seating and positioning professionals for their seating clients:

• Improve the body’s ability to normalize tone
• Increase proximal stability for distal function
• Redistribute pressure to prevent decubitus and increase comfort
• Enhance limited function by minimizing negative implications of abnormal

movements

• Increase endurance
• Ease of care

The ability of a seating system to move and change with the client demonstrates it’s dynamic nature, as sitting is a dynamic endeavor. Many users can benefit from a more dynamic system, but none so much as the users with abnormal muscular tone.

The rest of this presentation will focus on specific case studies involving complex seating issues. All of the young users demanded systems that would allow them, primarily, to increase their functional potential and improve their position through tone control, comfort and adaptability. Secondarily, we worked toward the rest of our seating goals of pressure reduction, increasing endurance and maximizing functional movement.

The program consists of many picture slides with before, during and after shots. There will be discussions regarding each clients needs and outcomes, and therefore, little need for fervent note-taking.