ARC HIPPOTHERAPY

We offer up to half hour sessions to those living with both physical and cognitive disabilities. It is not appropriate in all conditions and cases, a full physiotherapy assessment is necessary to establish the appropriateness of the intervention for each child or adult. Once approved, the rider is enrolled into our Friday morning programme which runs between 9.00am and 1.30pm. Their half hour session is timed, as much as we are able, to fit in with the distance they travel, work, school, or nursery hours. 

Their therapy is lead by a specially trained licenced physiotherapist, directing the specific therapy she has assessed the participant rider requires. Sometimes a fifteen-minute session is all she feels the child or adult can tolerate initially.

The highly trained horse selected for the rider is chosen for its size, gait, and ability to tolerate the unusual movements and positioning of the rider on its back. The rider, depending on their size and weight, is either lifted on to the horse or mounted using the hydraulic lift platform. The rider sits on a soft pad, so they can easily feel the movement, warmth, and rhythm of the horse.

A specially trained leader leads the horse in the session with a trained helper either side of the rider, holding on to the lower leg or supporting the upper body of the rider if need be. These side helpers follow the physiotherapists instruction providing the necessary therapy for the rider to improve their motor and cognitive skills.

At the end of the session the rider will be helped to dismount safely. They will not need the hydraulic lift.

Riders are initially booked in for a block of eight to twelve once weekly sessions. At the end of each block the rider is reassessed and depending on their progress they can be either recommended to come for another block, stop hippotherapy or progress to therapeutic or regular riding in an RDA group. Riders can attend hippotherapy for several years if their condition continues to show improvement but is still below the level required to progress to therapeutic riding.