Advice needed RE cerabral palsy

[HardlyEverHoovers]

Hi, I'm hoping I might be able to find some advice on here regarding my nephew. He lives in a 'developing' country, and when he was about 6 months old became very ill, and at one point his parents thought they would lose him. It is not clear what the illness was, but it involved an extremely high temperature over several days which the doctors there were not able to control. Thankfully he recovered but has ongoing problems.

The long and short of it is that to me he looks clearly like a child with cerabral palsy. I have some experience of this through my work, and I recognise the combination of weakness and rigidity, but I have no where near enough experience to know that for sure. The last time I saw him he was 2 and a half. He can crawl but not walk without someone supporting both his arms. He has a trike in the house and scoots about on that at some speed. His limbs are weak and his head and neck are stiff and also turned at an angle. He is cross eyed (sorry I'm sure that's the wrong expression to use), and wears very thick glasses. He behaviour and intellect seems to me to be about right for his age. He plays with his brothers and sisters, and is starting to speak fairly clearly.

The problem is that from what I can gather there is a real lack of knowledge in their country, and while he does attend phsyiotherapy of some sort, his mother told me that the doctor said there is nothing wrong with him and he will get better. This broke my heart because I am 95% sure that while he may well grow up to be a capable man, he will not be 'getting better', as he is disabled, rather than ill.

I managed to find some information in their language on cerabral palsy, but am reluctant to send them that without knowing for sure that it's that.

All general advice welcomed but my particular questions are:
Is there anything else that looks like cerebral palsy?
Could he 'get better'?
What advice can I give them, or equipment can I take them, from here, which is going to be appropriate as I'm scared of doing the wrong thing and upsetting them, or worse, making his problems worse?
Many thanks

Hello

come and join this thread (or have a read)

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/special_needs/1334870-support-information-sharing-thread-for-parents-of-children-with-Cerebral-Palsy

Is there anythign else that looks like CP. I don't know, as I don't know what CP looks like! however there are some conditions with similarities (for example one of my cousins had mengingitis and has some similar effects).

If it is CP, early intervention can limit the damage, but no cp does not get better, it gets better managed. However it also depends on where the weaknesses are and what happens when children grow. It is a static condition but sometimes when children grow it appears to get worse as the muscles don't gorw at the same rate.

as for what to help, the book recommended there is excellent with pictures even if you don't take it has has some ideas you may find useful to use as games

www.amazon.co.uk/Teaching-Children-Cerebral-Movement-Disorders/dp/1890627720/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1355838474&sr=8-1

other than that a gym ball is great for core strength and quite cheap (and fun) ditto hula hoops,

Thanks for the advice thereonthestair, I'll have a look at the thread, and a gym ball and hula hoop are great suggestions as they would be fairly easy for me to take over.