WATER TOWER FARM THERAPEUTIC
RIDING PROGRAM
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The Therapeutic Riding Experience
A little nine-year-old girl is wheeled across the parking lot and into the arena. Her mother pushes the wheelchair up a long ramp. There, two attendants help the child get out of the wheel chair and two individuals on the ground, standing next to a waiting horse, help ease the little girl from atop the ramp’s platform and onto the standing horse. The child sustained a traumatic brain injury suffered in a car accident several years ago that left her severely physically handicapped.
With the help of her father, a five-year-old girl walks across the parking lot and into the arena. The little girl has cerebral palsy, her legs so tight with spasticity that they cross each other with each step. Attendants help her into the saddle of a patient horse standing aside a mounting block.
The four-year-old boy has autism. His kinesthesia (his awareness of where his body is in relation to his environment) is distorted, so very different than it is for you or I. He is talked through the steps of how to get on the horse.
Two individuals assisting the children are volunteers, a third is both an experienced riding instructor and a physical therapist assistant, and a fourth is an experienced rider and trainer and a registered physical therapist.
What these three children have in common is that for the next ½ hour they will be physically and emotionally challenged as participants in hippotherapy (hippo – from the Greek word, horse) sessions, one of the disciplines of the farm’s therapeutic riding program. Each of the children also receives some traditional physical therapy services. Hippotherapy often provides more effective and efficient means of therapy. With children, if therapy is not “play based,” i.e., fun or motivating, success can be more challenging to attain. A child does not “understand” the benefits of, or may not be receptive to, 30 minutes of painful stretching of tight muscles in a clinical setting. But 30 minutes of straddling a warm, affectionate, moving horse while playing ball, tag, or Simon Says is fun and motivating: the subconscious efforts at working trunk muscles and staying balanced as a horse moves in the same multiplane fashion, as we walk, produces therapeutic gains not easily accomplished in a sterile clinical setting.For the girl who sustained a traumatic brain injury, she is making progress toward regaining her ability to walk. The little girl with cerebral palsy dismounts after her ride, and is able to walk normally for a period of time. Over time, the autistic boy, getting sensation from the movement of the horse’s body, is able to alter some of his distorted spatial awareness and is no longer bumping into objects.
Our Program's History
A physical therapist by profession, therapeutic riding married my two passions – physical therapy and horses. In 2002, a physical therapist assistant, with whom I worked, and I started doing a few therapeutic riding sessions at my farm with my appaloosa school mare. We were initially providing contracted services for the area's nonprofit home health agency, where both the physical therapist assistant and I worked, thereby offering local children this progressive therapy option. In both my current employment, and with several previous years experience providing contracted services to school systems, I was well acquainted with special needs children. It was in those previous years working with school children that I became involved with a therapeutic riding program that was providing services to some of the children I was working with. In 2004, we started providing services to non-agency clients, and shortly thereafter, established our freestanding therapeutic riding operation. Our program continued to grow and over the years the physical therapist assistant and I became NARHA certified therapeutic riding instructors. Our program advanced from being a NARHA member site in 2006 to our current status as a NARHA Premier Accreditation Center Program (one of only three such credentialed operations in the state)
Our program’s current focus is primarily hippotherapy.
Legally only licensed Allied Health Care professionals with a strong background
in posture
and movement, neuromotor function, and sensory processing can provide
this service. Under certain circumstances, the program’s services may be covered
under some insurance programs. NARHA training now enables us to expand into
other “Equine Assisted Activities” that have more emotional, social and
psychological goals.
Our goal is to expand our program and offer more
services to the community we serve. Long term we would like to develop a
research study to help improve evidence-based documentation that hippotherapy is
a goal measurable treatment modality. Anyone interested in learning more about
Therapeutic Riding and Hippotherapy should go to
www.narha.org.
.
Our Personnel
Dianne Lashoones, a New England native, has been a
licensed physical therapist for 32 years in a number of private and public settings, including sports therapy, geriatrics, and special needs children and
adults. She is owns and operates Water Tower Farm, a public equestrian
facility, established in 1989, that also houses her Tennessee Walking Horse
breeding, training and sales operations. Dianne is a Certified Tennessee
Walking Tennessee Walking Horse Instructor and a NARHA Certified Therapeutic
Riding Instructor.
Libby Hale, a northern East Coast native, has been a
licensed physical therapist assistant for 18 years. She is an ARIA
(American
Riding Instructor Association) Certified Recreational Riding Instructor, a NARHA
Certified Therapeutic Riding Instructor and an AHA (American Hippotherapy
Association) Level II hippotherapy practioner.
Our Volunteers
Our volunteers come from all walks of life. Some are area high school and college students, some parents of special needs children, and some are individuals who would someday like to be NARHA Certified Instructors. All volunteers go thru an on-site training program to acquaint themselves with the work expected of them, such as side walkers and horse handlers, and to allow us to judge how well they would be able to fulfill the requirements of their assigned responsibilities.
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Elisha |
Crystal |
Shanna |
Shane |
Kaitlin |
Alex |
Our Steady Steeds
Although our farm's Tennessee Walking Horses are an integral part of the riding program, occasional use of other breeds, especially trotting breeds, is also beneficial therapy. Key attributes of all the horses used in the program are a quiet and calm demeanor, and patience and respect for their challenged riders. All horses used in the program are evaluated for suitability for use in the program. In their off-hours, they enjoy recreational rides on our farm’s woodland trails.
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Holly |
Topper |
Lightning |
Lil' Man |
Pepper |
Frequently Asked Questions
What is therapeutic riding? In the broadest sense of the term, therapeutic riding can be defined as any equine-assisted activity whose purpose is to positively contribute to the cognitive, physical, emotional and social well being of individuals with disabilities, thereby positively impacting their life skills and enhancing their quality of life. Such equine-assisted activities have been shown to improve muscle tone balance, posture, coordination, motor development, as well as emotional well being. Therapeutic riding provides benefits in the areas of therapy, education, sport and recreation.
What is hippotherapy? Hippotherapy provides medical or rehabilitative treatment/therapy using the rhythmic, symmetrical and bilateral movements of a horse, along with guidance and direction provided by the duly licensed medical professional therapist, to provide multi-sensory input, proprioception, movement through space, repetition and variability as a treatment tool. The movements of a horse are used by the therapist to facilitate outcomes for rehabilitative goals established by evaluation. The object of the use of the horse is the sensory-motor experience. Hippotherapy is a part of a comprehensive and personalized physical, occupational or speech therapy strategy.
What is NARHA? NARHA (North America Riding for the Handicapped Association) is a national non-profit, members' organization, established in 1969, that changes and enriches lives by promoting excellence in equine assisted activities for individuals with special needs by fostering safe, professional, ethical and therapeutic equine activities through education, communication, standards and research. NARHA provides an educational and standard setting forum for its members and their therapeutic riding programs as well as an advocacy component for special needs individuals. Just as other professions use accreditation and licensing for the well being of their industries, NARHA provides the same for therapeutic equine professionals to demonstrate their proficiency. For more information about NARHA visit www.narha.org or call 800-369-RIDE.
What is the AHA? The AHA (American Hippotherapy Association) is a national non-profit members organization, established in 1992 to provide a forum of education, communication and research. Like NARHA, it provides a standards of practice framework to educate and guide those therapist who provide hippotherapy services. The AHA administers an educational framework recognizing a therapist’s progression thru its progressive curricula, that combines hands-on practice plus instruction, which, with the successful completion its national examination, cumulate in the distinction of being recognized as a Hippotherapy Clinical Specialist (HPCS). For more information about AHA visit www.americanhippotherapyassociation.org or call1888-851-4592.
What is a Premier Accredited Center Program? The Premier Accredited Center Program offers NARHA centers the chance to demonstrate their excellence in providing quality, professional equine assisted activities. This voluntary process recognizes NARHA centers that have met established industry standards. The accreditation process is a peer review system, in which trained volunteers visit and evaluate centers in accordance with NARHA standards. Centers that meet the accreditation requirements based on the administrative, facility, program and applicable special interest standards become Premier Accredited Centers for a period of 5 years. Centers must renew that accreditation by the end of the fifth year. A center must have at least one registered instructor and have been a NARHA member for at least a year, before applying.
What is a NARHA certified registered instructor? A NARHA certified instructor is one who has completed required course work, taken and passed a written proficiency test, shown equine mastery and completed a prescribed number of supervised hours of providing therapy, including designing individuals’ therapy goals and evaluating the efficacy of therapy sessions.
11/26/2007