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PEDro celebrates Juvenile Arthritis Awareness Month July 2020

Juvenile arthritis is an umbrella term used for paediatric rheumatic disease, it is an autoimmune condition affecting 1 in 1000 children worldwide. The most common type is juvenile idiopathic arthritis, but the term also includes juvenile lupus, vasculitis, juvenile myositis and juvenile scleroderma.

Physiotherapists provide pain management, land and aquatic based exercise therapy, braces and orthotics, and advice on structured physical activity in order to improve range of motion, functional ability, fitness, and quality of life for children with juvenile arthritis. Clinicians, caregivers, and patients use a shared decision-making process that considers patients’ values and preferences when formulating a treatment plan.

There is a growing amount of high-quality clinical research to guide the physiotherapy management of juvenile arthritis. PEDro currently indexes over 50 clinical practice guidelines, systematic reviews and randomised controlled trials evaluating physiotherapy treatment of juvenile arthritis.

You may like to review the following practice guidelines, which provide useful summaries for physiotherapists working with children in this clinical area:

Useful systematic reviews regarding exercise therapy for juvenile arthritis include:

To keep up-to-date with the latest trials, reviews and guidelines evaluating physiotherapy interventions for children with juvenile arthritis, subscribe to the “paediatrics” feed of PEDro’s Evidence in your inbox. Subscription is free.

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