A retrospective study was done to determine the influence of age on surgical outcomes in children with cerebral palsy. The study looked at 32 children with bilateral spastic cerebral palsy (17 males and 15 females) with ages ranging from 5 years 8 months old to 15 years 6 months old. Each subject had one multilevel surgical experience without any previous surgery, recent botox or intrathecal baclofen. In addition, the subjects were all ambulatory with a flexed knee gait, GMCFS levels II and III. Data was collected at 6 times from presurgical to 10 or more years postoperatively. Following statistical analysis, the results indicated that the older the child was at the time of surgery the better the long term results. There was no correlation between the age at the time of surgery and the number of initial surgical interventions that had to be performed. The researchers concluded that children with cerebral palsy who need multilevel surgeries will achieve better results at an older age compared to having the surgery at a younger age.
Reference: Svehlík M, Steinwender G, Kraus T, Saraph V, Lehmann T, Linhart WE, Zwick EB.The influence of age at single-event multilevel surgery on outcome in children with cerebral palsy who walk with flexed knee gait. Dev Med Child Neurol. 2011 Jun 29. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-8749.2011.03995.x. [Epub ahead of print]
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