The injury of Cerebral Palsy manifests as problems with tone (muscle stiffness or floppiness), uncontrollable movement (dyskinesia), and poor balance and coordination (ataxia). There are four main types of CP: spastic (affects 80% of patients and is characterized by increased muscle tone, stiffness, tightness of two or more limbs: one side, the legs, or all four arms and legs), dyskinetic (manifest by problems controlling movement. Writhing, rapid, or jerky movements and varying tone are common), Ataxic (problems with balance and coordination), Mixed (a combination of the other 3 types). Some also consider hypotonia a type of CP where the child has very low body tone, is floppy, weak, and cannot support his/her weight. In addition to motor problems, CP children can also have other problems that are the result of the injury process affecting wider areas of the brain. These include problems with cognition, vision, hearing, emotion, behavior, and autonomic function (constipation, poor circulation).

Children with Cerebral Palsy experience a generalized improvement in their neurological deficits. In Dr. Harch’s experience, the seven most common dysfunctions which improve in CP children under his care are: 1) Alertness and awareness, 2) Gross motor function (movement of arms and legs), 3) Fine motor function (use of hands and fingers), 4) Tone (high tone comes down and low tone increases), 5) Cognition and speech, 6) Oral motor function (chewing, swallowing, drooling, secretion handling), 7) Balance (sitting or standing, depending on stage of development at time of HBOT). Our average CP patient sees improvement in 4 of these 7 dysfunctions. In addition, patients with cortical impairment of vision or hearing, and those with autonomic dysfunction will often see improvement. These improvements have been documented in published studies.