The Cerebral Palsy Research Network plans to add early detection of cerebral palsy (CP) to its national registry to accelerate the pace of research in early intervention (EI) for children with CP. Early intervention holds the promise to improve outcomes for children with CP. CP Research Network Co-Principal Investigators Lisa Letzkus, PhD, RN, CPNP-AC and Zachary Vesoulis, MD, MSCI will present the study design to the community in a webinar next Thursday, September 21, at 8 pm ET. This free MyCP webinar is open for anyone who registers from the CP community or the clinical care community and will be recorded.

Dr. Letzkus is a nurse practitioner and nurse scientist that leads the early detection program at UVA Health in Charlottesville VA and Dr. Vesoulis is neonatologist and NIH funded researcher at Washington University in St. Louis. The two will present our planned research project, its goals and how it may impact outcomes in CP. They will both be available for questions and answers following the presentation.

The CP Research Network clinical registry has recently exceeded 8,000 patients from sites across its network and continues to grow. Patients are enrolled in the registry when they have a clinic visit or an intervention related to CP. Because the network was founded before the early detection guidelines had been created, most of those patients are enrolled at age two or later. The opportunity to begin enrolling patients as early as 12 weeks at our sites that follow the early detection guidelines would be a tremendous benefit to researchers who seek to test early interventions to improve outcomes for children with CP. And because our registry is longitudinal, we will be able to follow children as the progress through milestones and see how early diagnosis and intervention impacts the lives of children with CP. Please join us to learn about this exciting research initiative.