Activities for non-verbal children with mental retardation

[NurseLoveJoy88, ASN, RN]

i know this type of question was posted before but i cannot find the thread. please feel free to either answer or post the link to the thread about activities for a brain dead child.

i have a client that is basically non-verbal with mental retardation. he is not able to speak, have no cognitive or motor function. i do talk to him and play with toys that have music. he seems to respond to the music well. of course i do rom exercises with him too. what other things can i do with him throughout my 11 hour shift.

i play with the toys, rub his head, put on cartoons, do my nursing duties but sometimes i feel like that is not enough. i feel guilty for just "sitting " there watching him sleep and breath.

as you can tell from my many previous posts i have had a difficulty time adjusting to peds hh:crying2:. if i could i would go back to sub acute or ltc in a heart beat but i haven't had any offers yet. i'm trying to be the best nurse i can to these beautiful children i have in my care. any advice or encouragement would be helpful.

[ventmommy]

My son loves light touch - light massage, rubbing the backs of your nails up his legs, back, arms. He also likes tactile things around his hands - putting them in a bowl of uncooked long rice, uncooked beans, sand (use a large towel, this can be messy), tactile books. Does the child like being sung to? (Although some of our nurses are WAY to self-conscious to do this.) He also likes being read to and when the nurses get sick of baby books, they will read the newspaper or a novel or a nursing book to him. He doesn't have any real cognitive understanding so as long as they are reading to him in a nice tone, it doesn't matter what they read to him. We have an electronic keyboard and one of our nurses plays piano so she plays for him. He seems to enjoy that. Is there anything in the IEP or goals that you can do with him like reaching for an object, turning towards a sound?

[systoly]

Great suggestions by vent mommy. I think any sensory stimulation is good such as different textures, cool vs mildly warm, perhaps even a very simple form of cause and effect.

[NurseLoveJoy88, ASN, RN]

My son loves light touch - light massage, rubbing the backs of your nails up his legs, back, arms. He also likes tactile things around his hands - putting them in a bowl of uncooked long rice, uncooked beans, sand (use a large towel, this can be messy), tactile books. Does the child like being sung to? (Although some of our nurses are WAY to self-conscious to do this.) He also likes being read to and when the nurses get sick of baby books, they will read the newspaper or a novel or a nursing book to him. He doesn't have any real cognitive understanding so as long as they are reading to him in a nice tone, it doesn't matter what they read to him. We have an electronic keyboard and one of our nurses plays piano so she plays for him. He seems to enjoy that. Is there anything in the IEP or goals that you can do with him like reaching for an object, turning towards a sound?

Thanks ! Very informative. I do use alot of touch when I'm nursing. I also read. Thanks for reinforcing this. :redbeathe

[txredheadnurse, BSN, RN]

Vibrations, temperature sensory input (warmed towels patting face, hands and torso) or touching the outside of a glass of ice cubes as examples, scents, bubblewands, if the child is small enough to fit into one of those baby swings those can be quite successful in stimulation and just plain fun. Using a rocking chair is also great, especially if the child can be held on your lap while you read to him. Making little craft projects like gluing pasta or beads onto velour, sandcloth, rice cloth. You could do hand over hand with the child to apply the decor and then he has something colorful to look at, to touch and you can tell him a story about how he helped create this piece of art. I understand his functional level is low but I always talked to my clients just as if they were my peers. I personally dislike "baby talk" to clients.

I also always advocate for the use of therapy animals. They can do amazing things for even the lowest cognitive function. Included in this field can be the use of therapeutic horse riding. You might be surprised how well this can tone muscles and how even the most spastic or flaccid person can benefit from therapeutic riding.