Therapy means helping people get better.
Horse therapy is therapy with horses.
The name for this is hippotherapy.
In hippotherapy, people work with horses to help people feel better.
Here are some questions about hippotherapy:
- Who is hippotherapy for?
- How does it help?
- Who pays for hippotherapy?
- How do people learn more about it?
Read more to find out!
Where can you do hippotherapy?
In Karlshorst!
Karlshorst is a place in Berlin.
Berlin is a big city in Germany.
Karlshorst has a centre for hippotherapy.
People can ride horses there.
This helps these people feel better.
The centre is called the RBO.
To say the name of the centre, just say the letters R – B – O.
You can do hippotherapy in other places too.
But here we will tell you about the RBO.
Are the horses at the RBO happy?
For the horses, hippotherapy is work.
So there are rules.
One rule is that the horses must have breaks.
A break is when they stop working and rest.
Then the horses do not get too tired.
We want the horses to be happy.
We think that is important.
Children enjoy riding and learn new skills.
Who is hippotherapy for?
Hippotherapy helps lots of people.
- Children
- Young people
- Older people
Hippotherapy helps with different problems.
- Problems with your body
- Problems with your muscles
- Autism
- Learning disabilities
Autism means a person’s brain works differently.
Learning disabilities means a person finds it harder to learn things.
Hippotherapy is easy for many people.
Horses can make people feel good.
Because moving is fun with a horse.
How does hippotherapy help?
In hippotherapy you sit on a horse.
The horse walks slowly and carefully.
You move with the horse.
The movement is gentle.
It feels like walking.
This helps people:
- Learn movements
- Heal muscles
- Keep their balance
Hippotherapy helps your body.
It helps you feel good about yourself.
Children enjoy riding and learn new skills.
Who pays for hippotherapy?
Paying for therapy can be a problem.
When you are sick, you go to the doctor.
The doctor helps you get better.
Then a company pays the doctor.
That company is called an insurance company.
But for hippotherapy it is different.
Insurance companies sometimes
do not want to pay for hippotherapy.
You must have very good reasons.
If you have very good reasons, your insurance company might pay for hippotherapy.
When will an insurance company pay for hippotherapy?
- When you show them why you need this therapy
- When studies show that the therapy helps
Studies on hippotherapy
Some people think insurance companies should pay for hippotherapy.
But the insurance companies want to see studies.
A study is when people look at something very carefully.
Those people write down what they find.
We need studies of hippotherapy.
We need studies that show how it helps people.
There are studies of hippotherapy.
These studies ask questions:
- Do the people learn to move well?
- Does their balance get better?
- Do they feel tired?
- Does it help them work?
- Does it help them do things at home?
- Does it help them meet other people?
The studies show important things:
- Hippotherapy can help people.
- It helps people move better.
- It helps people do things like work.
Isabel Stolz has an app for hippotherapy
Isabel Stolz knows a lot about hippotherapy.
That means she is an expert.
She does studies on hippotherapy.
And she has an app.
The app is called EQUITEDO.
With the app, people can write down important things about the hippotherapy:
- Has the hippotherapy made the person better?
- Can they move better now?
- Does it help them do things like work?
The app can show how hippotherapy helps people.
This tells insurance companies to pay for the therapy.
The RBO centre in Karlshorst uses the app.
The RBO centre also works with Isabel Stolz.
She is doing research on hippotherapy.
She wants to find out how the effects of hippotherapy can be measured.
