Our Client
Ollie, a 13 year-old boy with spastic quadriplegic cerebral palsy living in south London.
The Background
Due to the nature of Ollie’s cerebral palsy, both his arms and legs are affected with a mixture of high (hypertonic) and low (hypotonic) muscle tone. This makes it very difficult for him to maintain his posture on the chair so he needed a chair that was very supportive and comfortable. His current chair had a chest harness to help keep his posture aligned but didn’t have the level of comfort Ollie required.
Download our Seating Assessment Guide to learn about the importance of pelvic positioning
The Challenge
The challenge that Ollie’s parents were faced with was to find a comfier chair that would provide enough postural support for his condition and be compatible with a chest harness to help keep him centralised in the chair.
As well as meeting these clinical requirements, Ollie’s parents wanted something “functional but fun” that Ollie would enjoy spending time in. They found us via an internet search and loved the look of the Little Lento with its bright colours and modern design.
The Solution
We loaned a Little Lento chair to Ollie so he could trial the harness attached to the cocoon backrest.
The Little Lento has all the features of our standard Lento care chair but designed for children and adults under 5’ 2” in height. The range of adjustment and choice of backrests make it a very adaptable chair for patients with complex neurological conditions. The beauty about this chair is the adjustable seat dimensions allow it to ‘grow with the child’ as their size and needs change over time.
The cocoon backrest that Ollie trialled is the most supportive backrest type as it ‘hugs’ the patient around their torso and upper body. We were able to facilitate Ollie’s chest harness by inserting slits in the backrest for the harness straps to pass through.
We carried out a remote video demo with Ollie in the chair so our assessor could talk the OT and client through the chair and how to configure it correctly.
Lento and Little Lento side-by-side
The Result
Ollie kept the loan chair until his brand new chair arrived in his chosen colour scheme, orange and black!
The main benefits of the solution we provided for Ollie were:
- Due to the Little Lento’s flexibility we were able to tailor it to his specific needs, in particular integrating the chest harness and providing extra seat and footrest depth adjustment.
- Our experienced assessor worked with the OT and family members to ensure all aspects of Ollie’s condition were taken into account.
The comments from Ollie’s parents sum it up best:
“I have to mention that the customer service at Vivid Care was second to none, Maxine was always at the end of the line if I needed any questions answered (which I did, often!), the loan of the demo chair was completely unexpected and the video demo with our OT at our house meant the chair was a perfect fit for Ollie. Many thanks to all of the team at Vivid Care, we wouldn’t hesitate to recommend you.”
If you need a chair that provides support for spasticity or another long-term condition, please contact us to arrange a no-obligation demonstration or seating assessment.
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