Motor planning in congenital hemiplegia.
OBJECTIVE
Cerebral Palsy (CP) is a broad definition of a neurological condition in which disorders in movement execution and postural control limit the performance of activities of daily living. In this paper, we first review studies on motor planning in hemiplegic CP. Second, preliminary data of a recent study on eye-hand coordination in participants with hemiplegic CP are presented. Here, the potential role of vision for online and prospective control of action was examined.


METHODS
Review and presentation of preliminary data of an eye- and hand movement registration experiment in hemiplegic CP.


RESULTS
Deficits in motor planning in hemiplegic CP contribute to limitations of activities of daily living. In the second part, exemplary plots of eye-hand coordination are presented for the affected and unaffected hand in one participant with hemiplegic CP, and for the preferred hand in controls, both as an illustration of the research methodology and to give an impression of the observed gaze patterns.


CONCLUSIONS
Research on CP should not solely focus on low-level aspects of action execution, but also take into account the more high-level aspects of motor control, such as planning. Possible deviations therein may be sought in altered gaze patterns as illustrated in the paper.
Steenbergen
Bert
B
NICI, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen, The Netherlands. steenbergen@nici.ru.nl
Verrel
Julius
J
Gordon
Andrew M
AM
D002547:Cerebral Palsy / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D002648:Child; D006225:Hand; D006429:Hemiplegia / Q000151:congenital* / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D006801:Humans; D009048:Motor Skills / Q000502:physiology*; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D026741:Physical Therapy Modalities; D014785:Vision, Ocular