EXPLORING HOW FUNCTIONAL IMPROVEMENT IS RELATED TO INTERACTION BETWEEN CHILDREN WITH CEREBRAL PALSY AND HORSES DURING HIPPOTHERAPY: A PILOT STUDY
Loading...
Date
2019-11-22
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Abstract
Hippotherapy (HPOT) refers to how occupational therapy, physical therapy and speech-language pathology professionals use evidence-based practice and clinical reasoning in the purposeful manipulation of equine movement as a therapy tool. There is limited scientific, evidence-based research to support the effects of HPOT, hence there is a need for such equine-assisted therapy for individuals with cerebral palsy (CP). This pilot study evaluated the impact of HPOT between children with CP and horses in terms of kinetics. The participants were 4 children with CP between 3 and 12 years of age. Eight 20-minute sessions of HPOT treatments were conducted, with data collection on days 1, 4 and 8. Functional mobility was measured using the Timed Up and Go test for 3 subjects and 10-Meter walk test for 1 subject, all performed before and after HPOT on data collection days. Six Inertial Measurement Units (IMU) devices were used to measure the acceleration of the children and horses during the HPOT. The IMU sensor data was analyzed using fast Fourier transformation (FFT) and cross-correlation with a time shift. The study is to determine the rationale behind the success of HPOT.
The results show that as the therapy progressed, the subjects demonstrated a significant decrease in the time required to complete the functional mobility tests and improved in the ability to synchronize with the horse’s movement in the up-and-down direction. In conclusion, this study provides evidence that HPOT can be leading to improved functional mobility for children with CP as evidenced by the positive interaction between the movements of the children with CP and the horse. Future work includes analyzing data in other planes of movement and evaluating causality between improved functional mobility and positive interaction.
Description
Keywords
Hippotherapy, Cerebral Palsy, Functional mobility, Interaction, IMU, FFT, Correlation, Acceleration, Kinetics