Cues and Treatment

Noticing cues is an important part of Sensory Stimulation as you want to know when the infant is ready to be stimulated and when they are becoming overstimulated.

Cues to look for:
Overwhelmed and not ready to interact:

• increased heart and breathing rate.



• closing eyes and avoiding eye contact.



• facial grimace.



• irritability



• frowning



• stiffening and extending limbs as well as arching back.



• showing signs of fatigue by yawning, hiccuping, or coughing.
  

Ready to interact:

• Steady breathing and heart rate.



• Holding eye contact with people and alert
  
  

Treatment:

Warren, (1994) states that these are the treatment processes for Sensory Stimulation on the SCBU ward:

• Positioning and Handling: educate family on appropriate positions to reduce stress, improve self regulation, and to normalise muscle tone.




• Stimulation/Adaptation: Educating parents on appropriate stimulation, monitoring, background noise, and lighting. Also adapting the environment to modify sensory input and minimise stress.




• Developing Feeding Skills: Using Sensory Stimulation to prepare the child for feeding and handling and positioning during feeding.




• Interaction with others: Help Parents/Caregivers understand behavioural cues. Provide techniques such as massage that facilitate parent-child interaction.




• Caregiver Support: Provide appropriate support for parents. This could be in terms of education, information, reassurance, encouragement, and referring them to other services if needed.

OTs Role in SCBU

Quick Summary of OT Role in SCBU:
From my research these are some of the basic things that I think an OT would do in SCBU:

• 
  
  Deals with positioning and handling of infant
  



• 
  
  Prepares Baby and Family for home environment.
  



• 
  
  Provides education to parents and family.
  



• 
  
  Conducts assessments where appropriate.
  



• 
  
  Helps family with Transition from hospital to home.
  
  

More in depth explanation of OT Role:

"Special Care Baby Units (SCBUs) provide care for preterm, low birth weight infants and for neonates who are sick... occupational therapists have started to establish roles within these units" (Warren, 1992, p 218). Occupational therapists main area of concern is to enable people (this includes infants) to carry out activities of daily living. For an Infant these activities could be things such as feeding or helping the infant to develop the appropriate developmental skills through sensory stimulation.

Warren, (1994) states that the aims of an OT in the SCBU are to monitor the babies needs and adapt the environment accordingly, as well as to facilitate interaction of baby and carer. Warren, (1992) states that OTs will get involved in treatment by using Positioning, Handling, Stimulation, Assessing infants skill, helping with feeding, providing parent support, and finally helping with transition to home ans well as follow-up.

In my Opinion there is definitely reason for OTs to work in the SCBU with infants. I believe OTs have the perfect knowledge and skill base for this area as we are well trained in education approaches and we are used to incorporating family members into our treatment plans. Furthermore OTs are used to their role overlapping with other professions and working collaboratively as part of a team.