Sciacca, Simona painter at 3 years old to cure a rare disease

Palermo – The joy of Simona, a three-year-old girl who, out of therapy and passion, started painting, translates into solidarity gestures. It happens in Sicily, where the parents of the little girl suffering from arthrogryposis, a rare form of stiffness in the upper and lower limbs, have donated a touch screen PC complete with educational software for children and many other interactive toys to the pediatric rehabilitation of the ICS Maugeri in Sciacca. . Dad Pietro and mum Valentina, from Ribera (Agrigento), assisted their daughter in long hospital stays and in the first surgical interventions for a disease that, explains the same mother, “did not allow her to raise her arms and grab objects up to a year ago ».

The little girl, after the surgeries first on the Infant Jesus of Rome and then at the Hospital of Trieste, has begun at the Institute of Sciacca (the only one of the 18 Maugeri Institutes that offers pediatric rehabilitation) a specialized work that has borne several fruits. “During the rehabilitation activities Simona was stimulated to discover the paints with her hands on the paper and, to the surprise of all of us, she made creations on canvas”, says Angela De Palo, coordinator of the Institute’s therapists. On a couple of occasions the family has held exhibitions with Simona’s “paintings” and, with the sums collected from the “sale” of the works, has supported the Trieste Surgical Children Association and Maugeri’s pediatric rehabilitation clinic. “This is a structure that we opened in 2016 to meet the needs of the territory and at the request of the Asp Agrigento”, explains Domenico De Cicco, director and head of the Maugeri Institutes in Sicily. “We follow 151 minors with disabilities of various pathologies, from autism spectrum disorder, cognitive retardation, genetic syndromes, psychomotor and speech retardation up to infantile cerebral palsy with physiotherapists, neuropsychomotricists and speech therapists who, otherwise, would have had to move many tens of kilometers for adequate therapies, ”he adds.