Pediatric Rehabilitation
Helping Children Build Life Skills
Torrance Memorial Pediatric Rehabilitation program offers extensive rehabilitation therapy services, including physical, occupational, speech and recreational therapy. Rehabilitation therapists provide developmentally and culturally appropriate evaluations and treatment for children from birth to 18 years of age. The entire health care team collaborates with children and their families to achieve the child’s maximum physical, emotional, social, and learning potential. Torrance Memorial’s provides rehabilitation services both during a child’s stay in the hospital and through follow-up care in the Rehabilitation Outpatient Center.
Multidisciplinary Care Team
The pediatric rehabilitation care team sees children with a wide range of conditions due to disability, injury or illness. Individualized treatment helps children gain or regain as much function as possible while instilling a sense of independence and well-being. The pediatric rehabilitation care team provides services in many multi-disciplinary core care teams throughout the hospital, as well as within Outpatient Center.
We see a broad range of diagnoses including (but not limited to) the following:
- Autism Spectrum Disorder
- Torticollis and plagiocephaly
- Developmental delay (gross motor and fine motor delays)
- Peripheral nerve injuries such as brachial plexus injuries
- Neurologic impairments such as cerebral palsy, hypotonia, ataxia
- Orthopedic impairments such as hip dysplasia, post fractures, post-surgical care, JRA, scoliosis, amputations, arthrogryposis
- Feeding and swallowing difficulties in the newborn, toddler and young child
- Sensory processing disorders (not requiring suspended equipment or sensory integration clinic)
- Burns
- Visual motor/ visual perceptual delay
- Chromosomal, metabolic and genetic disorders such as Down Syndrome, Prader-Willi, Rett Syndrome and muscular dystrophy
- Congenital anomalies including Spina Bifida
- Autoimmune disorders such as scleroderma and Guillain-Barre’ Syndrome
Personalized Treatment
Each child is individually evaluated and an age appropriate treatment program is created. Our staff works closely with the family to incorporate newly developed skills as well directed activities to enhance progress into the child’s daily schedule. The following treatment techniques may be used:
- Incorporating gross motor, fine motor, and visual therapeutic activities into play
- Therapeutic exercise for range of motion and strengthening (including manual techniques, modalities as appropriate)
- Neuromuscular facilitation techniques
- Balance activities, sensory integration techniques
- Feeding and swallowing treatment including techniques to decrease oral defensiveness
- Gait training and also partial weight bearing gait training (with the pediatric Lite-Gait)
- Developmental activities
- Training in self-care and activities of daily living (ADL’s)
- Compensatory techniques (i.e.: for visual/perceptual deficits)
- Family and caregiver training
- Recommendations for adaptive equipment, braces, cranial remolding
- Splint fabrication and modification
