Sit-to-stand movement in children with cerebral palsy: a critical review

Sit-to-stand (STS) movement is widely performed in daily life and an important pre requisite for acquisition of functional abilities. However, STS is a biomechanical demanding task which requires high levels of neuromuscular coordination, muscle strength and postural control. As children with cerebral palsy (CP) exhibit a series of impairments in body structures and functions, STS movement performance could be impaired in this population. Thus, this article aimed to review studies that had described how STS movement is performed by children with CP, the factors that influence it and the methodological procedures adopted in it analyses. A search was performed by one reviewer in relevant databases. In all, 12 articles were identified and 9 were selected for the present review. It was detected a large variation in sample characteristics and methodological issues among studies. In fact, standardization of the method applied to STS movement analysis is not fully established. With regard to STS performance, children with CP exhibited variations among them and also when compared with their typical peers. Moreover extrinsic factors appear to influence STS movement performance in these children and its manipulation could be incorporated into rehabilitation protocols. Moreover, the relationship between STS movement and functionality in reviewed articles was not reported. Therefore the review allowed to observe that STS movement has been under-explored in children with CP, with a lack of standardized methodologies and a not well established relationship between this movement and functionality. Thus, further studies about STS movement in CP are necessary.