On Wednesday, March 25, at 8 pm ET, the Cerebral Palsy Research Network will host a webinar about a new resource called IMPROVE CP* that guides treatment discussions among patients, families and their healthcare providers. Healthcare today recognizes the importance of incorporating patient and family values and preferences in making decisions about treatments. The IMPROVE CP tools help ensure the perspectives of the family are incorporated during the decision making process.

This IMPROVE CP project has been completed in partnership with Dr. Unni Narayanan and The Hospital for Sick Children (Sickkids) and Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital in Toronto, Canada, and Dr. Kristie Bjornson of Seattle Children’s Hospital. Both Narayanan and Bjornson are enthusiastic champions of including patient and family voices in healthcare decision making and in research.

The webinar will be organized as follows:

1. Dr. Narayanan will describe the underlying patient-reported outcome measures (what results patients and families report) that are used in the IMPROVE CP project and how their output can be used in clinical and surgical decision making with families.
2. Connie Liebow, a physical therapist at Seattle Children’s Hospital, will describe how the hospital has changed how the approach patient care by using IMPROVE CP.
3. CP Research Network CEO Paul Gross will share with parents how they can access the IMPROVE CP decision-making tools on CPRN.org to support future discussions with their CP doctors and therapists.

When considering an orthopedic procedure for “improving” how someone walks, it is vital to arrive at some common understanding between patients, parents and surgeons about what “improving” means. The patient may have a desire to walk faster or have better balance, whereas the surgeon may be more focused on improving the gait biomechanics, which might be important but or may not address the patient’s goals. These are important aspects to discuss together to determine the treatment that has the best possible chance of addressing both healthcare providers’ concerns and the family’s concerns and goals too.

The CP Research Network seeks to develop practical tools like IMPROVE CP to support the participation and inclusion of people living with CP in managing their healthcare.

Click here to see What is “Shared Decision-Making” and Why Does it Matter?