What are the signs and symptoms of pediatric cerebral palsy?

  The clinical manifestations of cerebral palsy are various, mainly as follows: (1) Early manifestations: ① Mental symptoms: over-excited, often crying continuously, difficult to fall asleep. (1) Early manifestations: (1) Mental symptoms: excessive agitation, constant crying, difficulty in sleeping, violent reaction to sudden sound and position change, whole body shaking, crying like frightened.  ②Feeding difficulties: uncoordinated sucking and swallowing, slow weight gain.  (3) Difficulty in nursing: It is difficult to put the arms into the sleeves when dressing, difficult to spread the thighs apart when changing diapers, and when the feet just touch the edge of the bath tub or the water surface during bathing, the infant’s back immediately stiffens in an arch shape and is accompanied by crying.  (2) Motor dysfunction: all manifest as follows: ① Delayed motor development: including delayed gross or fine motor movement and reduced active movement.  (2) abnormal muscle tone: manifested as hypertonia, myotonia, hypotonia and muscle tone incoordination.  ③Posture abnormalities: posture at rest such as tense neck reflex posture, tonic limb posture, coracoid posture, hemiplegic posture; posture abnormalities at activity such as choreiform tics and torsional spasms, spastic paraplegic gait, cerebellar ataxic gait.  ④Abnormal reflexes: the primary reflexes disappear slowly, the protective reflexes appear slowly, and the Vojta postural reflexes are abnormal, including pull reflex, trunk lift reflex, Collin’s horizontal and vertical reflexes, standing and inverted position, and oblique hanging reflex.  (1) Spasticity: The highest incidence, accounting for 60% to 70% of all patients, often mixed with other types of symptoms, with lesions affecting the cone bundle system. The symptoms were mainly central paresis, with increased muscle tone in the affected limbs, limb movement limitation, postural abnormalities, hyperactive deep tendon reflexes, and positive ankle clonus. The upper extremity had increased flexor tone, shoulder joint inversion, elbow, wrist and finger joint flexion. The knee and hip joints of the lower extremities were flexed in the prone position; it was difficult to raise the head in the prone position; at the beginning of sitting, the head was tilted backward, and later, when sitting, it was difficult to straighten the legs and the spine was posteriorly convex, and the lower extremities were in a “W” shape when kneeling; when standing, the hips and knees were slightly flexed and the toes were on the ground; when walking, the gait was tiptoe and scissor-like. There are 7 types of hemiplegia according to the area of involvement: ① Spastic hemiplegia: one limb and trunk are involved, and the upper limb is more heavily involved than the lower limb. There is reduced spontaneous movement of the paralyzed side of the limb, delayed walking, hemiplegic gait, and toeing of the affected limb. Convulsions occur in about 1/3 of the children at the age of 1 to 2 years. About 25% of the children have cognitive abnormalities and mental retardation.  (2) Spastic diplegia (diplegia): The limbs are involved, but the lower limbs are more involved and the upper limbs and trunk are less involved. It is often detected when the infant starts to crawl. The lower extremities are scissor-like crossed when the child’s armpits are held up. If the two lower limbs are predominantly affected, the child’s intellectual development is normal and convulsions are rarely combined.  It is the most severe type of cerebral palsy and is often combined with mental retardation, language disorders, visual abnormalities and convulsive seizures.  It is the most severe type of cerebral palsy.  ⑤Doublehemiplegia: all four limbs are involved, but the upper limbs are more involved than the lower limbs or the degree of paralysis is not consistent between the left and right sides.  (6) Triplegia: three limbs are involved, mostly upper limbs plus both lower limbs are paralyzed.  (7) Monoplegia: A single limb is involved. Monoplegia is mild and easily misdiagnosed, and is more likely to be misdiagnosed if it occurs in the non-lethal hand.  (The main lesion is in the extrapyramidal system. It is characterized by involuntary movements that are difficult to control by will, and when conscious movements are performed, involuntary, uncoordinated and ineffective movements increase. These movements disappear during sleep. There is a decrease in muscle tone, weakness in head raising, difficulty in feeding, often tongue protrusion and salivation, and after 1 year of age, tardive dyskinesia, significant speech difficulties due to mouth muscle involvement, slurred speech and involvement of voice modulation. Usually there is no cone bundle sign, the mental retardation of tardive dyskinesia is not serious and convulsions are uncommon. With the widespread development of perinatal care, this type is now rare.  (3) Tonic type (rigidity): this type is rarely seen, due to the significant increase of generalized muscle tone, abnormal stiffness and reduced movement, mainly due to extrapyramidal symptoms, so that when the limbs do passive movements, the active and antagonistic muscles have continuous resistance, and the muscle tone is increased in a lead tube or gear-like manner, and the tendon reflexes are not hyperactive, often accompanied by severe mental retardation.  (4) Ataxic type (ataxia): can occur alone or together with other types. The main lesion is in the cerebellum. Clinical manifestations include unstable gait, wider spacing between the feet when walking, uncoordinated movements of the limbs, intentional tremor in the upper limbs, poor fast-transforming movements, easy errors in finger-nose tests, and hypotonia. This type is not common.  (5) Tremor type (tremor): this type is rare, manifesting as tremor of the extremities, mostly resting tremor.  (6) Hypotonia (atonia): It is characterized by hypotonia, limbs are limp, and there is little voluntary movement. In the supine position, the limbs are in an abducted and externally rotated position like a supine frog, and in the prone position, the head cannot be raised. It is often confused with muscle relaxation due to muscle disease, but the hypotonia type can lead to tendon reflexes. Most cases turn into spasticity or tardive dyskinesia after infancy and early childhood.  (7) Mixed type (mixed): The same child can show symptoms of the above two to three types. The spastic type and the tardive dyskinesia type are often involved at the same time. There are a few children who cannot be classified.