Patient portal
We treat patients who are suffering from any sort of disability and help them to recover as much functional capacity as possible to facilitate their rapid reintegration.
The Rehabilitation and Physical Medicine Department seeks to prevent, diagnose and treat disability in children and adolescents. Our team is made up of various rehabilitation specialists, and we engage in coordinated efforts and simultaneous multidisciplinary collaboration with experts from other disciplines.
We take a comprehensive, personalised, highly scientific and human approach to each patient. Our goal is centred on the interests of each child and the involvement of the family in our programme. We start with intensive care in the acute phase during admission and follow-up with outpatient care when the child has returned home.
We take part in scientific studies, with a particular emphasis on innovation, and later apply the results to our treatments.
Who are our patients
Children and adolescents with secondary temporary or permanent disabilities of different origins. The most common are:
- Acquired brain damage due to traumatic brain injury, stroke and infectious or tumoural processes.
- Neuromuscular diseases. Muscular dystrophies, including Duchenne muscular dystrophy, spinal muscular atrophy and neuropathies such as Charcot–Marie–Tooth disease and myaesthenia gravis.
- Spina bifida and neural tube disorders.
- Congenital and acquired child spinal injury.
- Musculoskeletal diseases and deformities.
- Polytrauma and sequelae of fractures in general.
- Malformation syndromes (arthrogryposis and achondroplasia).
- Missing limbs and amputation.
- Obstetric brachial palsy.
- Cerebral palsy.
- Congenital muscular torticollis.
- Rheumatic diseases.
- Cystic fibrosis and other respiratory system conditions.
- Oncological diseases: central nervous system tumours, leukaemia and bone tumours.
- Bladder and anal sphincter dysfunction in children and adolescents.
Why SJD Barcelona Children's Hospital?
We are the largest child and youth rehabilitation department in Spain and the only one exclusive to these populations in Catalonia.
Wide experience
We are the largest child and youth rehabilitation department in Spain and the only one exclusive to these populations in Catalonia.
- We cover all stages of development, from birth up to 18 years of age.
- We treat more than 5,000 children per year, many of them from outside of Catalonia.
- We have more experience in neuromuscular diseases than any other centre in Spain.
- We are pioneers in the comprehensive treatment of children with brain tumours.
- Our department has a wealth of experience in child respiratory physiotherapy, and we have developed the Funny Friends computer game to make the exercises more fun.
- We treat a large number of children with rare diseases.
- We treat all diseases that cause disability, whether temporary or permanent.
We implement specialised programmes for complex diseases and have accrued recognised experience.
Highly specialized team
We implement specialised programmes for complex diseases and have accrued recognised experience
- Oncological diseases. We provide immediate care from the time of diagnosis. We have founded a Neuro-oncology Rehabilitation Unit.
- Neuromuscular diseases, with interdisciplinary team procedures on the same day, to limit the number of trips that the patient must make.
- Acquired Brain Damage (ABD) due to traumatic brain injury, stroke, infection, etc. We have founded a Multidisciplinary ABD Unit.
- Cystic fibrosis, maintaining multidisciplinary collaboration with the other sections of the Cystic Fibrosis Unit.
- We are experts in treating urinary and faecal incontinence in children.
We work in collaboration with all medical and surgical departments to plan the best treatment and its subsequent evaluation.
Multidisciplinarity and social support
We work in collaboration with all medical and surgical departments to plan the best treatment and its subsequent evaluation.
We offer multiple support programmes:
- "Ajuda't — Ajuda'l", to counsel parents in caring for disabled children.
- Sant Joan de Déu Sport School. Programme of physical activities and sport adapted for children with physical or mixed disabilities.
- Paediatric rehabilitation training programme for professionals who treat disabling diseases.
- Yearly respiratory physiotherapy course for physiotherapists who treat children with neurological diseases with respiratory complications.
We have developed different systems, devices and designs to facilitate patient recovery.
Innovation and excellence
We have developed different systems, devices and designs to facilitate patient recovery.
Our support systems include games, an exoskeleton for walking, robotic rehabilitation systems and using virtual reality in recovery programmes.
“Rehabilitation allows children to recover or improve function and thus interact more easily with their environment”
Specialties and services
The rehabilitation physician is a specialized professional in Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, which has extensive training in brain, spinal cord and musculoskeletal injuries. It aims to enhance and restore functional ability and life quality of people who have some kind of disability. Is an expert in the development of comprehensive treatment programs focused on the patient and performs the coordination of the entire team of professionals involved in it.
Treatments we offer
Our professionals
Research
Our professionals participate in different lines of research:
- Multicentre clinical trials with new drugs for Duchenne muscular dystrophy, spinal muscular atrophy and nemaline myopathy.
- European multicentre studies on outcome measures in children with Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA).
- Validation of the Spanish version of the Hammersmith Functional Motor Scale (HFMS) for children with SMA and of the EK and EK2 for neuromuscular patients in general.
- Project to study the natural history of spinal muscular atrophy.
- Project to study the natural history of collagen diseases.
Innovation
The Rehabilitation and Physical Medicine Department is constantly evolving thanks to its capacity for innovating and devising new support systems
- Development of an innovative computer game, Funny Friends, to make respiratory physiotherapy more fun.
- Participation in developing a robotic exoskeleton to facilitate walking in children with spinal muscular atrophy. Project in development, in collaboration with the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC).
- Development of a low-cost robotic system to aid in gait rehabilitation in children with serious motor disorders in collaboration with the Polytechnic University of Catalonia (UPC), in a RecerCaixa project.
- Use of virtual reality with the "hand tutor" for arm rehabilitation in children with hemiplegia.
- Design of a virtual platform to develop an exercise programme focused on speech disorders. The goal is previwed to be able to work from home under the supervision of speech therapists from the Hospital.
Teaching
SJD Barcelona Children's Hospital is a university hospital affiliated with the University of Barcelona, with which we share our knowledge and train professionals so that they may specialise in high-complexity medicine. Each year, 10 resident physicians are trained in the Rehabilitation and Physical Medicine Unit. In addition, we offer various undergraduate and postgraduate courses.
Undergraduate:
- Theory classes at several universities given by professionals from the department.
- Practical training programme for students from university schools of physiotherapy and students from university schools of occupational therapy in Catalonia.
Postgraduate:
- Training of Resident Physicians (MIR) specialising in Rehabilitation from other Spanish and international hospitals with no rehabilitation unit for children.
- Training of physiotherapists from postgraduate diploma and master's degree programmes in Paediatric Physiotherapy and Respiratory Physiotherapy.