Play integrated in physiotherapyy for children with chronic health conditions : A systematic literature review

Abstract: Background: Play is the child’s natural world. According to psychoanalytical studies, play has an important role in children’s development, and the absence of play during a child’s life could lead to severe pathological implications. Based on this theory and being aware that physiotherapy treatment programs could be long lasting, tiresome and lacking motivation for children, this literature review presents a perspective regarding the integration of play within physiotherapy programs and examines the physical and emotional outcomes during this integration. Aim: To investigate the outcomes of integrating play in physiotherapy for children with chronic health conditions. Method: The research strategy for this review was a thorough search of peer-reviewed articles in the databases CINAHL and AMED which include articles from the fields of allied and complementary medicine, as well as the database Scope Med. Participants were children with chronic health conditions, ranging from 2-18 years old. In the term ‘play’ virtual reality and video game activities were included due to the lack of research. In addition, articles from a previous literature review conducted by the author were also included in the present paper. Results: The focus of researchers on children with CP and the lack of evidence for children with other health conditions, the persistence of physiotherapists to assess mainly physical outcomes and not emotional needs of children, and the measurement tools used for this purpose are presented. Conclusions: For children with chronic health conditions who attend physiotherapy sessions, play could serve as a mediate and an appropriate developmental approach in order to achieve physical and emotional changes. There is a need for physiotherapists to balance physical and emotional needs, and have a more ‘human’ relationship, rather than a ‘bodily’ - strict professional relationship with children. Although the information presented in this review is not considered as sufficient to draw conclusions, it could serve as a first step for researchers to study this integration in greater depth, and to focus on children with conditions other than CP.