Pediatric patients suffering malignancies or metabolic and gastrointestinal diseases are often endangered by the therapy or the disease itself. Survivors and their families are emotionally and physically weakened, and the family resources are devastated, which can lead to divorce, neglect, financial crisis or loss of security.
To help the families in these difficult times, we provide social coaching to prevent unemployment, psychological support for recovery after trauma, dietary counseling for healthy food, physiotherapy for therapy and strengthening of the body functions, and the correction of mobility disorders. Improving children’s school performance is also one of the aims of pediatric rehab. In oncology the whole family is treated.
Since June 2018, VAMED and SALK have started up the first pediatric rehabilitation service in Austria for the aforementioned reasons. The Leuwaldhof is situated south of Salzburg, and is closely linked to an adult oncology rehabilitation center, which makes the transition of young adults to being treated by adult physicians easier after their return home. From the beginning, the patients can evaluate the effectiveness of rehab using a questionnaire on a “life app”, which can be used by the patients themselves on their own electronic devices, in cooperation with the Austrian Association of Insurance Companies.
We hope that the children and their families to come back to their lives strengthened, proud to have defeated or conquered a life-threatening disease, strong as an ox, with full steam ahead.