Article

A systematic review which aims to assess the evidence regarding the
function of the autonomic heart rate regulation system among children with
cerebral palsy (CP). METHODS: The target population included children with CP of
diverse severity, aged 1.5 to 18 years. Databases searched for English language studies from 1960 to 2013: PubMed, EMBASE, CINAHL, Cochrane Library, The
Physiotherapy Evidence Database (PEDro), and ClinicalTrials.gov site. Search
terms included 'cerebral palsy' or 'spastic diplegia' or 'hemiplegia' or
'quadriplegia' and 'autonomic nervous system' or 'heart rate variability' or
'sympathetic' or 'para sympathetic'. Twenty five articles were identified and
included if (1) participants were less than 18 years of age, (2) diagnosis of CP
was made after the age of 18 months (3) more than 80% of cases had a diagnosis of
CP and (4) autonomic cardiac heart rate regulation system state or response to a
stimuli was described for all the participants. Six articles met the criteria for
inclusion. RESULTS: Evidence suggests that reduced Heart Rate Variability (HRV)
time domain parameters close to birth are associated with a CP diagnosis at the
age of three years. In addition, HRV parameters' mean values, are significantly
lower among children with CP compared to typically developed (TD) control. While
performing head up, tilt or standing position, HRV was significantly reduced only
among TD control, but no effect was seen in those variables among children with CP. CONCLUSION: Further studies are needed to assess the potential to predict CP
by assessing HRV parameters among newborn children. In addition, assessing HRV
among children with CP may improve our understanding of the heart rate autonomic
system and its response to different stimulus such as muscle contraction, paced
breathing and aerobic training.

Langue : ANGLAIS