Upper Limb Therapy in Geelong & Surrounds
Learning to use your arm again
The functional use of your arm may be impacted upon by many conditions such as stroke, progressive neurological conditions, spinal cord injury, cerebral palsy, pain or amputation.
How we can help
We will complete an assessment of your arm to determine what component of function is impacting on the use of your arm and what your goals of using your arm are. It may be:
- weakness and muscle instability
- impaired sensation
- reduced control and coordination
- pain including phantom limb pain
- tone and spasticity
- perception of your own body
- learned non use
Following the assessment we will implement an intervention plan to address the issues identified in the assessment.
Repetition is an important aspect of retraining to encourage the nervous system to repair itself, also called neuroplasticity.
Depending on your goals, preferences and priorities we can assist with:
We have invested in equipment to assist with arm rehabilitation to ensure that our therapy is always goal directed, motivating and fun. This include the:
- Saebo kit: saebo stretch, saebo flex, saebo reach
- Able X therapy: interactive game based therapy
- InterX therapy: electric stimulation to improve pain and range of motion
- Blaze pods: interactive lights to provide targets within therapy
Its best to use a collaborative approach to arm therapy using a variety of modalities including:
- electrical stimulation
- casting and splinting
- reformer pilates machine
- constraint induced movement therapy
- functional retraining
- core and arm strength training
As always we will work with your multidisciplinary team to ensure your arm goals fit with your overall rehabilitation or maintenance goals.
Have a question for the GSOT team?
Occupations are everyday tasks that include things people need to, want to and are expected to do. (WFOT – World Federation of Occupational Therapists). Examples of occupations may be taking care of yourself and / or others, working, community activities and hobbies. Within occupational therapy we work with you to set client centred goals based on your strengths and limitations and work with you to achieve these functional goals.
The amount of funding you need for occupational therapy depends on your goals and your individual situation. We will conduct an initial assessment and following the initial assessment we will complete a report with a therapy plan giving you an indication of funding required to achieve each goal. We will discuss the importance of each goal with you so we can prioritise your funding. We normally suggest that you have 5 hours of funding available for the initial assessment, travel and report writing.
This will depend on your private health insurance. Please discuss with your private health insurance provider. In addition to private health insurance you can visit your GP and obtain a Enhanced Primary Care “EPC” plan for 5 discounted OT sessions.
Our therapists will meet with you at your chosen location. This may be in your home, place of work, in the community or at our clinic location.
We will complete an initial assessment which involves discussing and assessing your current function, limitations and strengths of function and then work together to form an intervention plan to achieve these goals. We will complete a report so you have a list of these goals and associated action plans.
It’s often helpful to have others present for your initial assessment to help provide information, this may be family members, support workers, other health professionals or support coordinators.