Martinsville Girl Earns Hero Award

Martinsville resident Katie Higgins, 8, has worked extremely hard over the past year to regain motor functions on her left side after undergoing surgery to relieve a life-long seizure disorder—and in honor of her hard work and amazing progress, she was awarded the Camp Helping Hands Heroes Award.

Camp Helping Hands was created in 2005 to serve as an occupational therapy program with Intensive Therapeutics, according to Courtenay Higgings, Katie’s mother.

“It provides a fun camp-like setting for children who suffer from hemiplegia, a one-sided weakness of an upper extremity,” she said. “The camp is regularly attended by children from around the region and country, as well as by children around the world, some traveling from as far as Saudi Arabia, Ireland, Canada and Australia.”

Katie, Higgins said, has been under the care of Scott Matthews, the founder of the organization, since she was 18 months old.

“Like many fellow camp-mates, Katie suffered from a stroke at birth which left her left side, primarily hand and arm, in need of therapeutic rehabilitation,” she said.

The program, Higgins said, provides constraint induced movement therapy, which provides the child with a cast on the unaffected limb, causing for the need for greater movement on the other side.

“The program tailors therapeutic interventions to a child’s individual needs and personal goals, and has been one of the most effective therapeutic treatments for our daughter,” she said.

But it was Katie's work recently that earned her the hero award, Higgins said.

This summer, Higgins said, marked the one-year anniversary of major brain surgery her daughter underwent to relieve the seizure disorder that came about as a result of the stroke.

“The surgery successfully eliminated her seizure activity, yet left her entire left side fully paralyzed, with the hope that most of the movement she had gained through her rehabilitation therapies could be regained under yet another, more rigorous physical and occupational therapy regiment,” she said.

Last summer, Higgins said, her daughter spent her time regaining left-sided gross motor function, learning to walk, run, skip and jump again.

But this was a challenge, Higgins said, and so her daughter piloted a new model of the program to wear the cast on the unaffected side for 24 hours a day, seven days a week for four weeks, plus one-on-one or group therapy for six hours a day, five days a week.

“This differs from the four-week camp in which children receive up to six hours of therapy, five days a week, in temporary casts which are removed at the end of the camp day,” she said. “Katie piloted the 24/7 model this July.”

At the end of the program, Higgins said, her daughter was able to throw a ball, brush her teeth, eat and unbuckle her seat belt, all with her left hand.

“She was pleased with the results of her hard work, and, at one point, after the cast was removed, she turned to me and said, ‘Mom, isn’t it great to have lefty back and working again,’” Higgins said.

And Katie received the award in front of more than 150 people, Higgins said.

“If it wasn’t for [Matthews] and Camp Helping Hands, I wouldn’t be able to do so many things,” Katie Higgins said when she received her award. “He teaches me not to give up and to believe in myself that I can do it.”

Courtenay Higgins, who was recently elected board president of Intensive Therapeutics, said she believes in the program and its success.

“The success of the pilot program should open the doors for more children to finally receive this type of intensive therapy in our region,” she said. “Katie is a hero to us every day, but her work this summer showed once again how her fiery spirit can move mountains. We are proud and inspired beyond words.”