SPEECH THERAPY ON THE HORSE

Life Spirit Speech Hippotherapy offers a unique opportunity and a multitude of benefits geared to meet the distinctive needs of each individual. Our hippotherapy program is offered at the J.F. Shea Therapeutic Riding Center in San Juan Capistrano.

The smiles and joy observed when individuals are offered the opportunity to interact and benefit from the relationship with our horses is powerful and healing! Therapeutic riding programs have been helping people in the United States and around the world since the 1950’s.

Our method is to utilize the horses movement creating sensation of the sensory domains (visual, auditory,  tactile, vestibular, proprioceptive). This input directs the rider into an optimal arousal state. The rider is more focused towards the intervention process than traditional clinical treatments. Behavior struggles are most often eliminated during the therapeutic process.

Program Goals & Benefits

1) Increase muscle strength to allow speech production.

2) Encourage ones’ sense of accomplishment and self-esteem.

7) Increase positive behavioral interactive skills.

8) Advance and encourage reciprocal interaction and social interactive skills, peer interaction and building friendships.

9) Increase one’s alertness and ability to interpret non-verbal communication signals while communicating with the horse and the instructors.

10) Stimulate and encourage auditory comprehension skill growth.

11) Increase the development of oral language skills.

Our speech language pathologist will conduct an initial evaluation in order to determine if a hippotherapy program is suited for the participant.

If the program is considered appropriate, the participant's speech and language intervention goals will be incorporated within the treatment program.

Safety is our number one focus! All treatment sessions are facilitated by an experienced team to ensure the participants safety. The team includes our speech language pathologist who has achieved certification in hippotherapy, along with a trained horse handler and two trained side walkers. Each participant wears a safety helmet and is continuously supervised.

The hippotherapy treatments are conducted in both equestrian arenas and on riding trails.