Scleroderma

[physiosmith]

Not sure which forum to put this in, but I have an acquaintance with what looks to me like fairly aggressive scleroderma who has asked me to provide physiotherapy for her.

She has been getting hip pain which has caused her to compensate when walking and now has started getting back pain too.

I'm sure I can help her with range of movement and core stability exercises, plus some manual therapy, but having never treated anyone with scleroderma before I wondered if anyone had any useful information or links, whether there is anything that I should be especially aware of, or whether there are any contra-indications that should be considered. All help and advice welcome.

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• Scleroderma

[physiosmith]

Hmm, this is going well.

[Physiobase]

Give it a bit of time my friend. Not everyone is sitting by their computer with free time on their hands.

Here's a start:

The Scleroderma Foundation

scleroderma.upmc.com/Treatment.htm

Scleroderma-info.com

Scleroderma.org- media forum 2004

[physiosmith]

Thanks for your help, though most of that relates to medical treatment. I was rather hoping that someone who deals with rheumatological patients might see it and be able to offer some more specific physio advice. There is info out there, I found this:

www.raynauds.org.uk/potio...herapy.pdf

It's fairly informative and I will give her a copy of it to read, but at present I haven't assessed her so I don't know quite how serious her condition is. I think it's pretty bad, as it seems to be affecting her speech recently, I don't know if it's just her facial muscles, or if her tongue is involved as well. I guess I need to assess her level of function/disability and take it from there - I can't fix her problems, but I can help ease the symptoms.