Designing effective treatment programs to improve strength, endurance and function in children with disabilities and chronic conditions can be enormously challenging. This course will help clinicians set realistic goals, prioritize treatment and implement successful programs for children with a variety of diagnoses including cerebral palsy, autism developmental coordination disorder, and obesity. An evidence based approach to outcome measures and intervention design will be discussed including frequency, intensity, duration and types of interventions to improve strength and function. Participants will observe and practice some of these measurement and intervention techniques during short demonstration sessions and case studies. Specific intervention activities will be discussed such as strategies to enhance strength, flexibility, endurance and function such as progressive resistive exercises, resistance bands, treadmill training, therapeutic ball exercises, aquatic exercise, structured play and yoga. Evidence on the effectiveness of existing community based programs and resources to improve physical activity, strength and endurance in children will be discussed.

Following completion of this course, participants will be able to:
1. Incorporate strengthening and endurance training strategies into treatment programs to maximize function in children with and without disabilities.
2. Integrate evidence from applied clinical and community-based strength and endurance training programs to enhance functional outcomes in children with and without disabilities.
3. Identify and use systematic and objective measures to document changes in function, strength and endurance at the body structure (impairment), activity (limitation) and participation (dis- ability) levels.
4. Identify clinical and community-based programs that provide evidence to support function, strength and endurance in children with and without disabilities.

Faculty:  Maggie O’Neil, PT, PhD, MPH and Maria Fragala-Pinkham, DPT, PT, MS

Co-Sponsored by: P.G. Chambers School and Education Resources, Inc.

Cost: To Be Determined

How to register: Please contact Education Resources at 1-800-487-6530 or visit www.educationresourcesinc.com