According to the World Health Organisation, it is estimated that people with cerebral palsy represent around 15% of the world's population and 2 out of every 1000 children are born with CP. In Portugal, around 20,000 people live with cerebral palsy, with an estimated 150 to 200 new cases every year.
Cerebral palsy encompasses a set of heterogeneous clinical disorders that differ in etiology, symptoms and severity. It is the most common developmental disorder in childhood, which conditions the life trajectory of the child and family, with an impact on the performance of functional day-to-day activities and social participation (home, school, community).
The future of a child with CP, like that of any other person, must be built step by step, achievement by achievement, and it is up to everyone around them to help them develop their potential to the full.
Physiotherapists play an important role in the process of (re)habilitating these children. Society must be able to help create opportunities to ensure that physical and/or cognitive limitations are not an obstacle to dreaming of the future, nor to reducing participation in different activities and contexts.
National Cerebral Palsy Day has been celebrated on 20 October since 2014, when resolution 27/2014 of 7 March was unanimously approved by the Portuguese Parliament.
