RESOURCES: Glossary
Definitions: A
Abnormal Movement Patterns: This is the abnormal recruitment of muscles in an attempt to perform an active movement or maintain a posture. If allowed to persist it becomes the 'learned pattern of movement' and diminishes the potential to be able achieve normal muscle activity.
Acalculia: Difficulty in performing simple mathematical problems.
Acuity: Sharpness or quality of a sensation. Adaptive/Assistive Equipment: A specific device that aids activities of daily living such as self-care, work or play/leisure activities, physical exercise or mobility.
Acceptance of Base of Support: This is the ability of an individual to accept the supporting surface, be it the floor, mat etc.
ADL: Activities of daily living, such as bathing, dressing, feeding, maintaining a household and other routine activities.
Affect: The observable emotional condition of an individual at any given time.
AFO: Ankle Foot Orthosis, this is a brace that maintains the ankle and foot in a plantigrade(90°) position.
Agnosia: Failure to recognize familiar objects although the sensory mechanism is intact. May occur for any sensory modality.
Agraphia: Inability to express thoughts in writing.
Akinetic Mutism: A condition of silent, alert-appearing, immobility that characterizes certain subacute or chronic states of altered consciousness. Sleep-wake cycles have been retained, but no observable evidence for mental activity is evident; spontaneous motor activity is lacking; person appears to be aware but inactive. Exhibited by persons with high brain stem lesions.
Alexia: Inability to read.
Amnesia: Lack of memory about events occurring during a particular period of time.
Aneurysm: A weakness which develops in the wall of a blood vessel causing it to bulge. As the wall weakens it may eventually burst resulting in a hemorrhage.
Anomia: Inability to recall names of objects. Persons with this problem often can speak fluently but have to use other words to describe familiar objects.
Anosmia: Loss of the sense of smell. Anoxia: Insufficient oxygen is being delivered to the cells in order for them to stay alive, thus the cells are damaged and die. If this occurs in the brain then brain damage results.
Anticoagulation: Process of slowing down normal blood clotting and thus preventing blood clots from forming. Sometimes referred to as "thinning the blood". Common medications utilized to accomplish this are Coumadin and Heparin.
Anticonvulsant: Medication used to decrease the possibility of a seizure (e.g. Dilantin, Phenobarbital, Mysoline, Tegretol).
Aphasia: Loss of the ability to express oneself and /or to understand language. Caused by damage to brain cells rather than deficits in speech or hearing organs.
Apraxia: Inability to carry out a complex or skilled movement; not due to paralysis, sensory changes, or deficiencies in understanding.
Apraxia, Constructional: Inability to assemble, build, draw, or copy accurately; not due to apraxia of single movements.
Apraxia, Ideomotor: Deficit in the execution of a movement due to inability to access the instructions to muscles stored by previous motor experience.
Arterial Line: A very thin tube ( catheter) inserted into an artery to allow direct measurement of the blood pressure, the amounts of oxygen and carbon dioxide in blood.
Arteriovenous Malformation (AVM): A "tangle" of blood vessels present from birth which may be prone to bleeding.
Associated Reactions: An increase in to a spastic pattern on activity or effort of a less affected body part. The response is associated with a stimuli that goes beyond the patient's level of inhibitory control. It always produces an increase in tone. Associated reactions are graded as mild, moderate or severe.
Aspiration: A foreign body or substance such as fluid or food enters the lungs via the trachea(wind pipe).this can result in a lung infection or pneumonia.
Astereognosia: Inability to recognize things by touch.
Ataxia: A problem of muscle coordination not due to apraxia, weakness, rigidity, spasticity or sensory loss. Caused by lesion of the cerebellum or basal ganglia. Can interfere with a person's ability to walk, talk, eat, and to perform other self care tasks.
Atrophy: A wasting away or decrease in size of a cell, tissue, organ, or part of the body caused by lack of nourishment, inactivity or loss of nerve supply.
Autonomic Dysreflexia: This is a syndrome that affects individuals that have sustained a spinal cord injury. It is due to the disturbance of the autonomic nervous system and causes vascular disturbances. It is a serious medical emergency and can be potentially fatal if left untreated as it can result in cerebral hemorrhage, heart failure or pulmonary edema.
Autonomic Nervous System: The autonomic nervous system is responsible for regulating the activities of the viscera and vessels and with maintaining constancy in the internal state of the body. It has two separate divisions, the sympathetic and parasympathetic.
Definitions: B
Balance: An holistic motor goal achieved on an automatic basis by the production of finely graded selective movement through reciprocal innervation. It is the interplay of activity of both sides of the body at the same moment in time.
Base of Support: The base of support is the area by which an object is supported and the area between its outer borders.
Bilateral: Pertaining to both right and left sides.
Bobath/NDT concept: A holistic approach to the assessment and treatment of patients with damage to the central nervous system resulting in a deviation from normal posture and selective movement. The concept requires an analysis of normal movement, analysis of the deviation and appropriate use of treatment techniques.
Brain Injury: Damage to the brain that results in impairments in one or more functions, including: arousal, attention, language, memory, reasoning, abstract thinking, judgment, problem-solving, sensory abilities, perceptual abilities, motor abilities, psycho social behavior, information processing and speech. The damage may be caused by external physical force, insufficient blood supply, toxic substances, malignancy, disease-producing organisms, congenital disorders, birth trauma or degenerative processes.
Brain Injury, Closed: Occurs when the head accelerates and then rapidly decelerates or collides with another object (for example the windshield of a car) and brain tissue is damaged, not by the presence of a foreign object within the brain, but by violent smashing, stretching , and twisting of brain tissue. Closed brain injuries typically cause diffuse tissue damage that results in disabilities which are generalized and highly variable. Brain Plasticity: The ability of intact brain cells to take over functions of damaged cells.