Investigation of Motor Abilities According to Gender in Children with Diplegic Cerebral Palsy

Objective: The aim of this study was to compare the fine and gross motor skills of children with diplegic cerebral palsy (CP) according to gender.Methods: This study included 73 children with diplegic CP (39 males, mean age: 8.76 +/- 1.4; 34 females mean age: 8.29 +/- 1.31 years) aged between 6 to 12 years. Bruininks-Oseretsky Test 2-Short Form (BOT2-SF), consisting of 8 subtests and 12 items, was used to evaluate the gross and fine motor skills of children. Fine and gross motor skills of children with CP were compared with Student's t-test.Results: According to gender, the BOT2-SF total score and fine motor precision, bilateral coordination and upper-limb coordination scores of sub-tests were statistically significant higher in girls than in boys (p<0.05).Conclusion: The results of our current study reflect that fine and gross motor skills of girls with diplegic CP are better than boys. Physiotherapists and ergotherapists should first determine the fine and gross motor skill problems with objective measurement methods and especially consider the differences between genders when determining an integrated multi-factor therapeutic approach for children with diplegic CP.