Effects of Square-Stepping Exercise on Balance in children with Down Syndrome

Down syndrome is a genetic disorder caused by an additional copy of chromosome 21, which results in 47 chromosomes instead of 46. When it comes to everyday activities and overall quality of life, children with Down syndrome may experience delays in their motor development, as well as challenges in learning to balance and initiate movements. Square-stepping exercise (SSE) involves a series of movement patterns such as forward, backward, lateral, and oblique stepping. It is easy-to-follow, structured balancing protocol. Square-stepping exercise program has also been used in intervention for children with autism spectrum disorder and studies have shown that this protocol effectively enhances balance in the kindergarten-aged children. In this study, the participants will be taken from Occupational therapy centres and Learning schools of Delhi NCR. Participants will be selected on the basis of inclusion criteria. Study design will be experimental and total sample size is 20. Participants will then be divided into two groups (Group - A and Group -B). i.e. 10 participants in each group. Group -A will receive regular occupational therapy and Square-stepping exercise program and Group – B will receive regular occupational therapy. The training programme will be given for 30 minutes, 3 times a week for 6 weeks.