THE USE OF ROBOTIC REHABILITATION IN THE TREATMENT OF MOTOR IMPAIRMENTS IN CHILDREN WITH CEREBRAL PALSY –A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW AND META-ANALYSIS

Cerebral palsy is a neurological disorder affecting motor function in children with cerebral palsy and requires new rehabilitation perspective beyond traditional pediatric treatments. Robotic-assisted gait training and other assistive devices as methods of robotic rehabilitation became popular as a way to improve motor function in pediatric patients with cerebral palsy. This meta-analysis evaluated the effectiveness of robotic rehabilitation on motor impairments in children with cerebral palsy, focusing on functional outcomes like gait, balance and gross motor skills. PubMed, Embase, Cochrane Library, Scopus and Web of Science databases were searched and research papers were included up to 2024. Studies with robotic interventions for children with cerebral palsy were included using the PICOS criteria. The primary outcome was to evaluate the improvement in motor function by measuring gross motor skills and gait parameters. Data analysis used effect size calculation, I² statistic for heterogeneity, Egger test and funnel plot analysis for publication bias, as well as meta regression analysis. This review included 56 research papers. Robotic-assisted rehabilitation showed improvements in motor skills, walking speed, balance and functional mobility with robotic-assisted gait training being the most effective. Moderate heterogeneity was I²=52% and no publication bias was found through this review. Robotic rehabilitation with focus on robotic-assisted gait training is showing improvements in motor function for children with cerebral palsy and has many advantages over traditional rehabilitation methods by allowing controlled repetitive training. Future research should focus on continuous outcomes and optimization protocols to assure that robotic-assisted rehabilitation is relevant to the field of pediatric neurorehabilitation. Keywords: Cerebral palsy, robotic rehabilitation, motor impairments, robotic-assisted gait training, children.