Low Muscle Tone? - Highland Park,NJ

Hi M.,

What Rachel wrote is not exactly correct. Hypotonia and muscle strength are 2 separate issues. Hypotonia is controlled by the nervous system, not the muscles. Hypotonia MIGHT go along with some other issue (such as autism, Down syndrome, etc.) or it might be an issue all by itself. You can't fix hypotonia by strengthening the muscles, but if you have stronger muscles, it can help mask the hypotonia a little.

I'm a pediatric PT, so I'm very familiar with kids with hypotonia. A lot depends on the degree of hypotonia. There's a big range from mild to severe (wheelchair-bound, can't stand up). Kids who have mild hypotonia often don't qualify for therapy in school unless the hypotonia affects some specific function at school. They tend to be very flexible. Some might benefit from some shoe insert orthotics to keep their feet in a good position as they grow and prevent back/knee pain. Sometimes these kids don't excel at athletics, and sometimes they do well in activities like gymnastics, ice skating, ballet, and martial arts, which require lots of flexibility. It is great for kids with mild hypotonia to do lots of activities like climbing, which helps keep their muscles as strong as possible.

Kids who have moderate or more severe hypotonia often qualify for school therapy to help them with specific activities like handwriting, sitting in their chairs, climbing stairs, etc. If they are too functional at school to qualify for therapy, they can usually receive private therapy at a clinic to help with any issues outside of school (balance, bike riding, etc.).

Hope this helps!

My daughter has Sensory Processing Disorder (SPD) and suffered from ear infections from little on; ear tubes at 5 months, 1.5 years, and 3 years old. Started Speech at the age of 3, then was in Early Childhood class when she was 4 years old. Halfway through the year, the teachers asked me if they could do some additional testing; they discovered that she had hypotonia (low muscle tone). She started OT/PT (OT/PT and speech were both through our local school district) right away and had it all the way through the 4th grade, when she "graduated."

I have to confess; until they asked if they could test her, I hadn't known she had an issue. After they started working with her, though, I realized just how much she really, really struggled to do. She is doing much, much better now. When we realized she had issues with balance and coordination, we also enrolled her in dance starting at the age of 4. She started with ballet and is now in jazz. It has helped her immensely and really helped with her muscle tone.

Along with her SPD my daughter also has some spatial issues and because of that isn't able to ride a bike. She is terrified--apparently, sitting on the seat and trying to balance on 2 wheels is tantamount to looking at a deep canyon beneath her. We tried everything known to man to get her to learn how to ride a two-wheel bicycle. She wants to ride a bike but doesn't want to have to balance on two wheels. So this spring we're going to buy her an adult tryke. I found a really nice, small, compact version that can be folded up and put into a trunk/SUV/truck box, so that's the one we're going to get for her. It's so neat that I think she's going to have to fight me to ride it!

Good luck!

I agree with Tara. I used to work in ECI and my son had hypotonia and sensory integration issues. I used a scrub brush technique to help him. You can learn that from a pediatric occupational therapist trained in SI.
My son didn't have behavior issues, but was very clumsy. He also had the handwriting issues. We used to joke about how bad his stick figure drawings looked. Now he is a very talented pen and ink artist and very athletic. So with the right therapies, this can turn out well.
Good luck and God bless.
Victoria

All three of mine had "low muscle tone." They qualified for PT. Truthfully, it's a total non-issue for us. Two of my three are really great athletes. One isn't, but it's more hand eye coordination that is a problem. Of course, some kids could have problems with low muscle tone but I think sometimes it's just a diagnosis they give kids (at least in my case) to qualify them for PT. My kids were all hanging on the monkey bars in kindergarten (and even before then).

Yes my middle son had this and some core muscle weakness. He wasn't even pulling himself to a standing position at a year old. I asked pediatrician about it and yep had to have early intervention evaluate him. He was in PT for 2 years and walked by the time he was 18 months old. He is 4 years old now and is doing well but still catching up with his coordination and fine motor skills but is a well adjusted kid. We have him in karate now to keep him stretching his muscles so they don't tighten up. My youngest has some mild muscle tone issues but walked on his own by 16 months. We are watching him as well and he seems to be hitting his milestones just fine.

One of my girl friends kids was diagnosed with low muscle tone; her pediatrician said there's usually another underlying issue that causes it... turns out, her son has juvenile arthritis, so it was painful for him to use his motor skills to build that muscle mass. Once they started treating the juvenile arthritis, his muscle mass was regained and aside from taking meds daily, her little boy is perfectly normal now! He's about 6 now and has no other side effects, and his doc said he will probably grow out of the arthritis as soon as his body starts generating the tissue around his joints.