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Cerebral Palsy Lawyers is an advocacy group providing information and legal advice to parents and legal guardians of babies diagnosed with cerebral palsy at birth or in the first few years of the baby's life.
There are many causes of cerebral palsy in babies. One cause is medical negligence, such as doctor or hospital errors during delivery or care during pregnancy.
The most common cerebral palsy is called "spastic cerebral palsy", which affects between 70 to 80 percent of diagnosed CP cases. Spastic cerebral palsy causes hypertonia, a tightening of the muscles. Spasticity may affect just the legs or one side of the body. If quadriplegia is diagnosed, all four limbs are affected with spasticity.
Athetoid cerebral palsy is diagnosed in about 25 percent of cerebral palsy cases. Another name for athetoid cerebral palsy is "dyskenetic cerebral palsy", which is known for slow, involuntary muscle movement along with mixed muscle tone (some muscles overly tone while others far less tone).
Hypotonic cerebral palsy is characterized by floppiness of the arms, legs and sometimes accompanied by poor head control.
Healthy infants will usually show a moderate amount of resistance when their arms or legs are moved, while children and infants with hypotonic cerebral palsy will show little or no resistance. Due to their poor muscle tone, those with hypotonic CP have trouble maintaining their posture, and often slouch, lie down, or lean over rather than holding themselves up. This type of CP is also associated with fatigue since a great deal of energy is needed to move the hands, arms and legs.
The least common type of cerebral palsy is ataxic, found in only 5 to 10 percent of those with CP. In this manifestation of CP the part of the cerebellum which controls balance and coordination is adversely affected. Ataxic cerebral palsy is characterized by poor muscle tone and difficulty coordinating movements in the arms, legs and torso.
In roughly 10% of those diagnosed with cerebral palsy (CP), several of the different types of cerebral palsy come together in the same person. This is known as "mixed cerebral palsy", the most common combination is having spastic and athetoid. This occurs in roughly 10% of all mixed CP cases. All other combinations of crebral palsy are possible, but are not nearly as common as spastic/athetoid combination.