Dr. Davis is one of San Francisco's finest house call specialist physicians and has been providing house calls and office visits to the Bay Area since 2005. His practice is built upon the philosophy that excellent customer service and excellent patient care go together. Dr. Davis works out of a charming 100-year-old Victorian home, and he believes that healing should begin when you walk in the door. While trained in modern medicine, Dr. Davis also has a deep appreciation of cultural anthropology, the natural sciences, and philosophy all of which he integrates with his medical practice. Dr. Davis received his MD from the University of Florida and completed his Family Practice residency at Lehigh Valley Family Practice. He has also lived, studied, and traveled abroad extensively, including for one year in Beijing, China, where he studied and practiced the principles of Traditional Chinese Medicine and Acupuncture.
JUSTIN C.K. DAVIS, M.D.: Hi. I'm Dr. Justin Davis and I'm here today to tell you a little bit about the condition known as cerebral palsy. Many of you have heard of cerebral palsy but what exactly is cerebral palsy? This is a condition that always occurs first in childhood and affects a part of the brain, there's actually brain damage that causes a dysfunction in motor or posture. Motor describes movement, so this means that the person affected will have difficulty in movement or in speech. Cerebral palsy, again, always occurs in early childhood or infancy. So, this can occur anytime from while a fetus is in the womb until up to two to three years of life. Things that cause cerebral palsy can range from diseases that the infant may have in the womb or they may suffer some kind of event that causes them to have a lack of oxygen temporarily to the brain. This can also happen in traumatic child births or after child birth, again, different kinds of disease or even a physical injury that somehow harms a part of the brain that controls the motor function will cause cerebral palsy. Symptoms of cerebral palsy can vary widely depending on exactly what part of the brain is damaged and just how damaged it is. But what is constant with cerebral palsy, as the name explains, is that there will always be some kind of problem with motor and speech function. Now, again, it can be severe or the person can hardly move at all or hardly speak at all are quite mild where you hardly notice anything at all. One thing to keep in mind though is that typically this really only affects the motor, coordination, and the speech, so not really the though process. So, while you may see someone with cerebral palsy, they may be in a wheelchair, they may have difficulty moving, or be very difficult to understand, keep in mind that they probably are just as intelligent as anyone and you should just treat them with a little bit of extra patience and respect. Treatment for cerebral palsy, unfortunately once it occurs, it's permanent and irreversible. However, there are many things that can be done by all different kinds of health professionals, doctors, nurses, physical therapist, teachers that can help someone that has cerebral palsy to either improve some of their motor function that they have or learn to cope better with some of the dysfunctions. As far as prevention of cerebral palsy, probably the best thing that one can do is to have good prenatal care, regular well-child check-ups and if you suspect that there may be some new behavior or something's wrong with your baby or child, always immediately notify your doctor.
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