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Interesting document to show significantly improvement after 12 weeks of hippotherapy on adolescents with cerebral palsy diplegia. Using the Physiological Cost Index and walking speed as outcome measures.

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Interesting document to show significantly improvement after 12 weeks of hippotherapy on adolescents with cerebral palsy diplegia. Using the Physiological Cost Index and walking speed as outcome measures.

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Back riding guidelines....im not sure if there are any more updated version of this? 

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Back riding guidelines....im not sure if there are any more updated version of this? 

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This would come under best practice.

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Useful document from Lauren Taite on understanding Hippotherapy in the context of the UK and other equestrian related therapies. 

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Useful document from Lauren Taite on understanding Hippotherapy in the context of the UK and other equestrian related therapies. 

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Trunk control is a relatively simple and free assessment:

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Although this is a bit dated now....i found it a useful resource to use when writing up my assignment and referencing FOR as these inevitability back up the clinical reasoning for Hippotherapy selection,

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Contra indicators/ Cautions

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I have links to some articles on my website. If you need other information, please let me know.

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THIS IS MY STORY

I am Ninette du Plessis and I fulfill different life roles with passion. Jesus Christ is part of my life and to honor Him I strive to love all people as I love myself. I am a wife to Jannie, my engineer husband with whom I share many adventures and life changing choices. I am a mother of many children, those that were born to us and those that were sent to us, those that stayed and those that went.

I am an occupational therapist who do not mind being unconventional if that means that my clients can reach their full potential.

I am also a friend, sister and daughter. Nature, adventure, books, needle work, writing, reading, movies, the list go on and on all excite me and I do believe that people only grow by going through difficulties.

My career took different paths as I was first of all a mother but did not want to compromise on the quality of therapy I gave to my clients. I worked in many different settings with many different clients through the years. Part of the journey was that one of our children had Pelizaeus Merzbacher Disease, his warm and friendly personality made the world, as we knew it, a better place. Yet this syndrome caused him to be totally dependent.

I took advice from a wise, experienced occupational therapist very seriously. She said: "Your son cannot go to the world; you therefore need to bring the world to him." This advice caused our family to be creative in whatever we did to include Mattias in camping, hiking, crafts, sport and cultural activities. One of the many ways we chose to bring the world to Mattias was through horse riding. Through him I came into contact with hippotherapy.

After Mattias passed away in 2009, I started treating other clients with the help of a horse, did the Equine Assisted Therapy Association of South Africa (EATASA) hippotherapy course and became a board member of EATASA in 2012. While working in a Step down facility in South Africa for four mornings a week and treating clients on horseback in the afternoons, I started research on the effect of hippotherapy to fulfill the requirements for a master's degree. I received this Mater degree in occupational therapy in April 2016 from the University of Pretoria.

As part of a "working holiday" and adventure we moved to United Arab Emirates in 2015 where I worked full time using hippotherapy as treatment strategy for three years and I gained valuable experience. Then we moved again for one more adventure before returning to South Africa, this time to the United Kingdom, where we live in a small village close to the Lake District. With grown children, I embarked on yet another academic endeavor - a PhD study (DEVELOPMENT OF TRANSDISCIPLINARY HIPPOTHERAPY PRACTICE GUIDELINES FOR CLIENTS WITH SPASTIC CEREBRAL PALSY [CP])- and hopefully it will open new doors to new adventures.

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In South Africa, hippotherapy is seen as part of the scope of practice of an occupational therapist, speech therapist and physiotherapist. In depth knowledge of children with special needs were already part of my four year training as an Occupational Therapist and as I am experienced in their treatment.

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Here are some hippotherapy definitions with a few comments. We might use it as working definitions to refine the EFOT-UK hippotherapy definition

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Here are a mapping review on hippotherapy that was published in 2019.
One of their goals was to see what definitions was used for hippotherapy. This might help us as well.

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Not specifically related to definition but these are evidenced based practice statements specific to hippotherapy service delivery and clinician competence.

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Just a throw down of ideas for discussion - then can follow up on getting the permissions etc

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Thought this was very clear and helpful document from the AHA

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Website for a charity I have volunteered with, link goes straight to their missions page that contains their definition.

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Another website that use a nice clear way to define Hippotherapy (USA not UK).