Hi All,

It has been sometime since I've written on this forum and I have been reading all your posts. It makes me sad remembering how our journey was but we are now at the otherside, and everyting is fine with Hailey; almost like a distant memory.
Hailey was not diagnosed until she was 8 months old, I knew something was wrong but no body would take it seriously. She went into a pavlik harness for 2 weeks- causing femoral nerve palsy as she was too old/big for the harness, then into a dennis broiwn bar for two weeks, then she had a closed reduction on her right hip and an open reduction on her left hip. A spica for 8 weeks, a rhino cast 24/7 for 6 weeks, the her L leg wasn't movong so well so rhino cast at night only for 6 weeks, the another review and the surgeon said leave it off. VERY long story short!! After this she quickly started moving "normally" she walked on the inside of her ankle to start with but now walks and runs pretty normally. She is 18 months old.
I will tell you some of the things that i found helped with having plaster on; also over summer.
Hailey wore size 3 or 4 dresses that fitted over the top of the plaster to hide it a bit. The outside of the plaster got filthy but it was ok. The other things that were good were the bonds coveralls, in a large size.
We used huggies newborn nappies and the Aldi newborns (which I found MUCH better), i used scissors and cut all the exta banding off the top at the back, tucked into the plaster and plenty tucked into the back. we actually found it easier to clean while she was laying on her back and then turn her over and tuck the nappy in the back. This also ment that we could make sure the nappy was flat and far enough up to stop the plaster getting wet. We then turned her over onto her back again and put a huggies walker over the top of the whole cast. I only neede to change this nappy once, sometimes twice a day as it never got wet. We had two leaks early on but it was ok after that.
We were not allowed to bath or shower her. We then wrapped the plaster in a towel and tipped her upside down a bit to was her hair and as much skin as we could reach!!
Not sure if the still sell them but a "dinky Diner" on ebay was the best way to secure Hailey to a chair and feed her.
Activity wise we tried to alternate her position as often as possible, sitting up, laying back, flat on her back or front. Lots of reading, bean bags were great.
She fitted over the 3 wheeled stroller, just careful of her ankles, people tend to walk way to close to prams.
Sleeping: the first week or so was ordinary. We then put eggshell foam over the whole cot matress and an extra layer up the top so her back layed on this and made it a bit higher than the plaster hence supporting it, (Does that make sense??) This actually seemed to help a bit. She then settled back into being a good sleeper.We also had a wedge that we put under one leg at bed time, then changed it when we went to bed then would take it out ealy hours of the morning. Just to distribute weight a bit over the night.
On her tummy i would put a bit of something, folded up hand towel, to lift her up, being mindful not to put pressure on her ankles as we found when she tried to lift her head it put a fair bit of pressure on her back on the cast.

I hope this gives you some tips.