Electrode Therapy?

[KristieM]

My son is 9 weeks old with BPP and began electrode therapy today in an attempt to wake up nerves in his right arm. We are scheduled to do electrode therapy twice/wk.

Has anyone went through electrode therapy? If so, does it work?

[Francine_Litz]

I'm sorry to share with you that we were told that e-stim should not be used at such an early age. They way I understand e-stim - it works on the muscles and not on the nerves. Actually NMES - shuts down the nerve temporarily so that 'it' (the unit) can stimulate the muscle.

I have a whole write up about it here:
http://www.injurednewborn.com/maia/estim.html

We were also told that using e-stim at too early an age can injure the bone growth plates. Please research this for yourself and also ask your bpi specialist if this is the treatment he suggests.

-francine

[SarahB]

Hi Kristie,
We did the same thing with our daughter at about 10 weeks old. A doctor we had seen for our daughter's bpi (a bpi specialist) suggested the e-stim and wrote a prescription for it. I hated watching it being done at therapy but thought it was o.k. since the doctor had written the prescription.
We went to Texas Children's Hospital when our daughter was 12 weeks and they said no to e-stim and that she is too young for it so we obviously stopped.
I know all of this can be overwhelming but this message board is a great source of information!

[Primrose]

We were also told no to e stim before a child is 2 yrs old. My ds did e stim for several months, but he was 3 yrs old. I'd research and check it out more before doing another session. We have not went through TCH, and it was actually his OT who suggested the e stim, but said we would have to wait until he was old enough. So I'm thinking it's probably more common to wait than not.

Pam

[Primrose]

BTW are they having you do any type of stimulation other than the electrodes? There are a lot of things you can do to stimulate the nerves at a young age. Brushing, ice, and different textures on the arm.

Pam