Case studies
Our little patient's progress: inside her DMI intensive
Two six-day intensive blocks in Zug, a GMFM-66 score that nearly doubled — and a little girl who now sits up to play, reaches for what she wants, and makes herself understood. Her story — and the numbers behind it.
This is the story of one of our youngest patients — a one-year-old girl who completed two intensive six-day therapy blocks at our centre in Zug. Her results surprised even us: measured on the GMFM-66 scale, she improved from 16.1 to 31.0 points — progress almost ten times greater than expected for the period.
The numbers
In November 2024 she scored 16.1 on the GMFM-66, the standardised measure of gross motor function we use in our assessments. By February 2025, after two intensive blocks, her score was 31.0 — a statistically significant gain of 14.9 points.
For context: the GMFM-66 scores gross motor function on a 0–100 scale, and in standard weekly therapy a gain of one or two points over a few months is considered solid progress. Nearly fifteen points in three months is a different order of change — the kind that only shows up clearly because we test before the first block and after the last one, with the same instrument each time.
New movement, new independence
Numbers only matter because of what they look like at home. She now sits independently while playing, shows markedly better trunk stability, and uses both hands together in coordinated play. She reaches purposefully for toys in front of her and to the side — a small phrase that means a whole new radius of action for a curious one-year-old.
"Fourteen points on a chart. At home, it looks like a little girl sitting up on her own to play."
— The Apexa teamFinding her voice
Motor progress rarely travels alone. Over the same months she established eye contact as a way of making choices, began expressing her needs through body movements, and showed noticeably more social interaction, with more deliberate attempts to communicate. When a child gains control over her body, she also gains new ways to reach the people around her.
Inside the therapy room
Her blocks combined DMI (Dynamic Movement Intervention) at Level C — intensive motor-control and balance work — with the Spider Cage for weight-bearing movement, Galileo whole-body vibration therapy for muscle and nerve stimulation, and NISE-Stim neuromuscular support. Every session was planned and measured within ORCA — Objective Reasoning & Clinical Architecture, our clinical framework — so each day built precisely on the one before.
A typical day opened gently, with warm-up and play, before moving into the focused blocks — always in doses matched to a one-year-old's stamina, with real rest in between. Intensity, at this age, doesn't mean pushing harder; it means practising the right movement often enough, while the learning is still fresh, for the nervous system to keep it.
Taking the progress home
Between and after the blocks, her family did the quiet work that makes results last: they were coached in positioning techniques and simple communication strategies, so every day at home consolidated what the sessions had opened up. How she sits on a parent's lap, how a toy is offered just far enough away, how a choice is presented so she can answer with her eyes — small adjustments, repeated dozens of times a day, that quietly keep the therapy going long after the block ends.
Every child's path is their own — but focused intensive blocks, modern tools and an involved family are a combination we see working again and again. If you'd like to know whether an intensive could help your child, talk to us — no pressure, just honest orientation.
