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Restoring the ability to walk is a key step toward independence

Physical Therapist Lennei Finck

I’ve been a physical therapist since 1977. I have a private practice where I see mostly children and adults with cerebral palsy. I use the Up n’ Go with a variety of kids. I love it because it controls their hips and gives them stability while taking the weight off. Many of the children I see have apoptosis. They have no control over their movements, even though they can make stepping motions. I use the Up n’ Go with guide bars to keep their feet positioned in the right direction and keep them symmetrical. This helps to control their movements.

In fact, the Up n’ Go is the only gait trainer that I use to correctly position my patients. In other gait trainers, they are usually sitting in a crooked position. With the Up n’ Go, their hips are stabilized, they get their feet under them and push forward to take steps, and the device stabilizes their pelvis. I use the guide bars to keep them symmetrical, with their legs properly placed forward, and the device correctly patterns their walking. Sometimes I also use the chest support accessory to keep them even more upright.

The Up n’ Go can be used for a variety of patients. I used it with a 73 year old woman who had recently had a stroke and kept falling backwards with a regular walker. The Up n’ Go allowed her to walk without loosing her balance.

I used it on a boy who had very low muscle tone. After using the Up n’ Go for almost a year, his mother told me that he could push the device himself, and go from a sitting to a standing position all by himself!

I used the Up n’ Go for a 15 year old who has Cerebral Palsy and is a spastic quadriplegic. He is in an electric wheelchair and he has Scoliosis. He lost the ability to walk at all, and had several operations to put rods in his spine, hamstring releases, and he also uses knee braces. With the Up n’ Go, he is walking the entire distance of his school and back again, and he uses it with his father every night for about an hour or so. When he graduated from middle school, there was a video of him walking with the Up n’ Go which caused a standing ovation.

I encourage the parents of my patients to use the Up n’ Go to practice correct walking and to get exercise. It is a great exercise tool, teaches patterning, helps in transfers, increases patient’s bone density, and generally keeps them healthy. I highly recommend the Up n’ Go!

Lennei Finck
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