I so often find myself marveling at the effects of MOVE even after 7 years of using it. Move has changed so many lives.

Each week at McBride I see and hear of students who are improving their skills in the MOVE Program. One day I'll see a student in a gait trainer with most of the prompts; next, he'll be missing some prompts and within months, walking in a K-walker. Some of the progress is quite astonishing. Sometimes I try to imagine what these students' lives would have been like without MOVE.

At Christmas, I borrowed a Pacer gait trainer (Rifton) and took it to the 71 year old mother of a friend of mine. This lady had a stroke 6 years ago and spends most of her time sitting on the sofa. She can only walk very slowly with some support and much prompting from her daughter. She has respiratory problems also. We got her up into the Pacer and she loved it. She liked being able to stand with no person holding her. She said right away that she could breath better, speak better and clear her lungs better. She also said she liked looking across at people rather than up at them from a chair or wheelchair. One of the days, she had to go to the doctor, so we took the Pacer with us. She was eager to get in it so when the doctor came into the room she could greet her eye to eye. The doctor thought it was a great thing for her.

Janet Maruhashi, a MOVE Site Trainer at McBride School, a MOVE Model Site in Los Angeles, CA.