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Children's Hand Skills Framework (CHSF)- OT Theory

The Children's Hand Skills Framework is a conceptual tool used to describe and analyze children's hand skills during assessment and intervention. The CHSF divides hand skills into 6 categories, based on the extent to which their hands are in contact with objects or parts of the body or not. These categories include manual gesture and body contact; these two categories do not involve contact with a specific object. The next categories are object-related hand skills, adaptive skilled hand use, bimanual use. The final category is general quality of hand use skills, such as accuracy or pace of children's hand skills. The population targeted with this theory, as indicated by the title, is children, and involves any diagnosis. Hand skills adequate enough to enable children to participate in daily occupations are considered functional in this framework. Object-related hand skills include actions such as reaching, turning/rotating, throwing, or catching an object. Adaptive skilled hand use includes  grasping, holding, and manipulating fingers. Bimanual or bilateral hand use involves using both hands to complete an action or skill. Hand skills are vital to a children's ability to participate in play, learning, and social activities, and the CHSF is a helpful tool in the evaluation of these skills.

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