Client Communitaction -

Sometimes it is necessary to talk about a kid while they are still in the room. You have to keep an eye on them and talk with the parents about what you found during the assessment or discuss what you are doing with them at that moment or how they responded to your treatment session. Really, its unavoidable a lot of the time.

But sometimes it seems like its detrimental to the child. When a talking about their child they often describe their personality. "Timmy* is really doesn't like playing with other kids", just for example. *This is not a real client. I am not a psychologist nor claim to be a behavioral expert, but I feel like this would rub off on a child over time. If your parents keep telling you that you are a certain way. Aren't you bound to believe them and will act in a way to reinforce this believed identity and hang onto it longer than the behavior may have otherwise lasted? Will Timmy now demonstrate how he does not play well with others during the session now that his parent has said that.


I feel like its really important to discuss with the therapist certain behaviors that you are seeing in your child or what you are concerned about, but I think it can have an impact on the session. For example when I was younger and we went to the Doctor's office and I was sick and my Mom described the symptoms for the Doctor I would always play up my symptoms. If she said I was coughing i would make sure that I got at least a few good hacks in there. If she said I was limping or favoring a leg, I would definitely limp for all I was worth when asked to walk.

(I am sure similar things occur internally with adults. I haven't had any experience there yet, but I will keep you posted. I am sure it is even more complex based on whether or not they want to be seeing the physiotherapist... to be continued.)

Maybe it would be best to discuss the subjective history of the child somewhere where they can't hear you. I know that the logistics make this difficult, but I think it would give the child a chance to present 'normally' without a trying to do what their parents are asking.

In the 0-2 category this is probably not as necessary as a lot of the kids are either infants and to young to hear you are don't have the language skills to really get a grasp on what you are saying. But for pre-schoolers who have been probably told why they are coming in to see the physiotherapist and what for they may present differently based on the information they have been given.

Bringing it back to communicating assessment findings etc. in front of the child; what is the parents obligation to tell the child about their diagnosis or progress. Should a child be kept in the dark about why they are seeing a physiotherapist. This is completely possible being that most of the therapies are disguised as games. A child may never know that they have below average balance for their age, they are just excited to be playing on the balance beam and doing obstacle courses. but do they have a right to know that they are 'behind'? I don't know if 'right' is the word to use, maybe another way of putting it would be: will telling the child that they have weakness or a balance issue help or hurt them more? Will telling a child that they have poor balance just make them fall more or would it help them overcome it? Of course a lot depends on the child and how the family approaches the disability.