Hippotherapy

We go and work  at Khetiwe once a week whilst we are on community which is a NPO run by a lady Glenys who is a physiotherapist. She provides therapy to children primarily with cerebral palsy and their mothers in the community. This week she invited us to attend Hippotherapy- horse riding with her and some of the children.

Now admittedly I have always heard about how amazing horse riding is for these kids but I never understood why or what was so good and had never really made an effort to find out. Turns out it is absolutely AMAZING! This therapy revolves around the movement of the horse. The horses movement is variable, rhythmic and repetitive and provides a dynamic base of support which is really good for their trunk control, strength and endurance. It also provides motor planning and gives sensory input to their vestibular, proprioceptive, tactile and visual systems. And what I found really interesting is that the movement of the horses back provides the same movement to that of walking!

So we can see why for OT’s and Physio’s hippotherapy really helps with meeting some of the aims common among all CP children. BUT who would have thought that Speech Therapists could also use hippotherapy as part of their intervention- yip!! The movement of the horse can be used to facilitate the physiologic systems that support speech and language.

The children absolutely loved riding the horses and it was so unreal to see how the children when completely transformed from when they were on the ground compared to when they were sitting on the horse. One little girl completely came to life- she was all smiles and laughs and was loving throwing and catching the ball from the horse and walking over all the obstacles.

It is so crazy how many amazing things there are out there that we can use as therapy we just have to put our feelers out and find them.