Blog: 'Our young adults are able to socialise while having fun and getting fit'
The English Federation of Disability Sport (EFDS) website features a blog post every Friday through the year.
This month's theme is sport and physical activity for disabled children, with Friday 20 November being United Nation's Universal Children’s Day.
This week, a Staffordshire and Stoke on Trent Partnership Trust Paediatric Physiotherapy Technician called Sarah Castledine-Pearce, discusses her and her team's new community project where young disabled people get fit while learning to work out in a mainstream gym setting.
Sarah’s blog:
As an experienced physiotherapy technician, part of my role includes going into a special schools locally, especially in Cannock, Staffordshire. I observed that by the time the school children, who were known to the Paediatric Physiotherapy Team, entered their teenage years they’d often become bored of PE lessons and their own physiotherapy sessions.
Historically, I’d seen examples of us discharging children from our care who appeared to be managing at the time, only to see their fitness drop off into an abyss. They would typically be 16 to 18 years old, and I felt like I hadn’t prepared them to live an active life.
They’d be discharged - as at this age they would be passed onto the adult teams - and I hadn’t opened avenues for them.
So I had the idea of introducing a fitness group, with music that would make the experience current to them. I wanted them to also be able to socialise while having fun and getting fit.
This developed a level of fitness and a need for these kids to enter a gym situation. I knew from experience that these children known to our service were never going to develop that level of confidence on their own.
At this point paediatric physiotherapists Jennifer Rogers, Angela Disbury and I started to set up our gym projects with the help of the local leisure industry. This was kindly jointly funded by Staffordshire and Stoke on Trent Partnership Trust, Sportivate and the English Federation of Disability Sport (EFDS).
Our gym sessions are for a range of participants with different needs, including wheelchair users in a gym setting. It could be for children with a range of diagnoses, such as hyper-mobility, weak muscles, problems with co-ordination or learning difficulties.
Some of the children are capable of using the gym on their own once they have been shown, whereas others would still require a personal guide or carer.
If you were to see a session in progress then I don’t think you’d be able to tell that any of these young people are disabled as they fitted into the setting so well.
On the first week all the participants need a lot more support and input. But week by week we reduce how much we communicate with the young adults so that they learn the skills to become independent. By week six all the participants are able to exercise independently or know how to ask leisure staff for support because in future weeks, once the sessions have been completed, I won’t be there.
Following the sessions given, many young adults are so confident in the environment and with the machines they’re using, that they continue to access the gym independently even without Physiotherapy support.
Many of our participants, have expressed how comfortable they are and continue to access the gym successfully as well as other physical activities like swimming and cycling. They also tell me it’s just not something they would have done before.
It’s even having an impact on parents! I know of two cases where the parents have joined the gym too, so they have gone from being a non-active family to turning their whole lives around and making significant changes in terms of fitness and physical training.
Since the start of the programme in September 2014, 24 children have benefitted and I hope that more will in the future. The biggest change I have observed is levels of self-confidence, not only with the children but also with their parents, who are in a way having to learn that their young adults are growing up. They need to trust us, and witness how their children can adapt to learn how to use the gym.
But there are physical impacts too, including improved muscle strength, muscle length and stamina. Plus there are social improvements, because all the young people we work with have got on with each other and began building friendships.
From my perspective, this project is really important. It’s right at the heart of the community.
Sport Across Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent (SASSOT) and SSOTP appear to agree, and have both given us awards: Celebration of Excellence and runners-up for Community Project of the Year 2015.
Historically, these children have been seen in a hospital or medical environment. This scheme is all about taking them out into a mainstream setting, encouraging them to participate and to be part of everyday life.
