Recommendations for the rehabilitation of children with cerebral palsy

The SINPIA-SIMPER (Italian Society of Child and Adolescent Neuropsychiatry Italian Society of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation) Intersociety Commission was set up in December 2000 and is composed of members from both scientific societies, who are experts in the field of rehabilitation of patients with cerebral palsy (CP). In accordance with the indications of the Italian Health Ministry's Planning Department, in 1999 this Commission was entrusted with the task of drawing up "Guidelines for the Rehabilitation of Children Affected by Cerebral Palsy", and to successively revise and update it every five years. The present document is a summary of the latest update, drawn up through meetings of the Intersociety Commission, held in 2012 and 2013, and discussed and approved at the annual SINPIA-SIMFER meeting held in Brindisi in October 2013. The current version of the Recommendations extends and updates the previous one, also addressing new areas of intervention and adding some in-depth analysis. The document as a whole is not so much a proposal for treatment updated on the basis of advancing knowledge in the field of rehabilitation of CP, as a presentation of the method that should be applied by professionals seeking to define the most appropriate intervention and treatment strategies. The text is the offspring of a process of careful exchanges, which have been conducted in a collegial and collaborative fashion among professionals working in different fields (rehabilitation medicine and child neuropsyehiatry) and in healthcare settings at different levels (ranging from first-level local settings to third-level national ones) and of different types (affiliated outpatient clinics and centers, local health authorities, hospitals, "IRCCS" research hospitals, universities).