CHILD MUSCLES TONE AND ITS DISTURBANCES
After birth, the muscles tone and movement allow the child to develop both physically and mentally. The baby learns to make its first movements – holding the head, pulling hands to toys, rolling from side to side and from stomach to back, and then sitting, crawling, standing up and walking. For timely implementation of these skills, adequate muscle tone is required. This concept refers to the minimum tension of skeletal muscles, which is kept by the body in a state of complete rest.
Almost all children are born with a physiologically high tone. Doctors explain the cause of this phenomenon simply: before birth, the baby is in a fetal position in the mom’s womb, while the musculature of the fetus is severely strained, its chin and limbs fit snugly to the body. In the muscle extensors of the head and neck the tone is higher than in the flexors, therefore the newborn’s head is slightly thrown back.
An elevated tone is common in the adductor muscles of the thighs of the child: if you try to move the baby’s legs apart, you might feel resistance. Legs of a healthy baby can be parted to 90 degrees (45 degrees from each side).
Muscle tone is largely dependent on the physical condition of the child, its physique and characteristics of the nervous system. During crying, anxiety or screaming, the tone naturally increases.
How to determine the tone? To do this, the doctor examines the baby and checks his reflexes, because, as we said, the muscle tone characterizes not only the nerve system function, but also the overall development of the child: both physical and mental. However, some of the disturbances may be determined in time by the parents themselves.
Complications during pregnancy, placental insufficiency, stress and reception of medicines, course of labor, induction of labor, caesarean delivery, and postpartum period affect the change of tone in the infant.
There are several most common disorders of muscle tone:
• Hypertonus or increased muscle tone
• Hypotonus or flaccidity
• Dystonia or uneven muscle tone
Hypertonus Symptoms in a Child
Increased muscle tension is a consequence of some disturbances of the nervous system. A child with hyper-tone is too restless and cries often, it does not sleep well and reacts to any sound, constantly belches after feeding, holds head well since birth (due to constant tension in the cervical muscles), often throws his head back when crying, and bends over. A characteristic feature is the kind of posture during sleep: baby's head is thrown back; arms and legs are pursed and tightly pressed against each other. If you carefully try to part them, you will feel significant resistance; repeated attempts will cause increased resistance and loud lamentation.
Hyper-tone can also be identified during the wakefulness of the baby. To do this, take the baby under the armpits, and put it on a flat surface (table is the best), holding it and slightly bend it forward. In this position, during the first months of life, an innate reflex of automatic gait is triggered in the baby, i.e. the baby starts to touch the legs, as if it’s walking. Herewith, a healthy child puts down the leg on the whole foot, while a baby with increased tone relies only on the toes (tiptoes). Walking «on tiptoes» - one of the classic diagnostic signs of disturbance of the nervous system function and muscle hyper-tone.
Even if you’ve discovered that your baby has signs of increased muscle tone, this is still not a confirmation of the diagnosis. Only a doctor can confirm or refute the presumptive diagnosis. The most important – do not ignore questionable signs of hyper-tone under any circumstances. If untreated, tone disturbances will lead to skeletal and joint deformities, movement and general development disorders.
One of the methods of combating hyper-tone is a massage, designed to relax muscles and relieve tension.
Symptoms of Dystonia
Uneven muscle tone in the child, "dystonia", is characterized as follows: some of the child’s muscles are in a very relaxed state, while others are severely strained. In this case, the baby shows signs of hyper-hypo-tone. It can be defined by placing the baby on his stomach onto a flat and hard surface. A child suffering from dystonia, will roll over to the side where themuscle tone is increased. In this case the body will bend in the form of an arc, while the baby’s pelvis and head will turn toward the tense muscles. Often one shoulder seems lower than the other, and even the head is often tilted in the same direction. Furthermore, on the side where the muscle tone is elevated, limb movements may be more or less significant than on the healthy one.
Massages help to correct many neurological and orthopedic disturbances. All babies have the so-called “residual reflexes”. Normally, these reflexes should be gone by 4 months of age. But in some children, they do not go away or go away very slowly. Massage and physiotherapy help eliminate residual reflections. In addition, they can be used to stop tremor – shaking of hands, chin and other parts of the body.
The emotional state of the child is very important during the massage and exercises.
Giving massage to a screaming child is not worth, because it will not give any results.
If the massage, the exercise, or any procedures make the baby cry and/or strain, it will lead to even more significant tension of the muscles and nerve system disorders. Therefore, during treatment it’s very important to maintain the “patient” in a calm state.
Course of the massage - 10-15 sessions. It has to be repeated at one month intervals up to the recovery. If the course is conducted properly, the baby’s motor activity will normalize.