41240877
Hippotherapy works wonders in speech I
MO CRANKER
f you’ve never heard of hippotherapy, then it’s probably best to not try to guess.
No, it is not therapy for hippopotamuses.
While it does not include hippos, hippotherapy actually includes horses — which are used as a tool by speech language pathologists, and occupational therapists help people speak and move better.
The form of therapy is well practised in the United States, but is just beginning to find its legs in Canada — with one hippotherapy clinic running at full-speed in southeastern Alberta.
A group going by the name of Speech & Language Works runs the horse-based therapy program in conjunction with one occupational therapist from the group AdvancedOK.
“We’ve been working to get this program going for a while,” said speech language pathologist Kristin Churchill. “At Speech Language Works we offer a range of programs that target children mainly, but getting a program that uses horses is big for us and for the area.”
On the speech side of hippotherapy, the horses are used in a variety of ways. Speech language pathologist Andrea Baht says one of the main functions of the horses involves the children on the horse giving a range of verbal commands to the animal.
“If we have a child who has trouble saying the letter ‘s’ or ‘t,’ we can use the word ‘stop’ as a tool,” she said. “We get the child up on the horse and moving, then we ask the child to clearly tell the horse to stop.
If the child succeeds, the horse will stop, which gives the child an instant indication they said the word correctly or incorrectly.”
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