Caring for Horses Eases Symptoms of Dementia

In a study published in the journal Anthrozoös, researchers from Ohio State University found that equine therapy — a treatment used today for children and teens who have emotional and development disorders — could also work for adults who are suffering from forms of dementia. The study found that people with Alzheimer’s were able to safely groom, feed and walk horses under supervision — and the experience improved their mood and made them less likely to resist care of become upset later in the day. An associate professor from Ohio State stated that equine therapy could supplement more common forms of animal therapy involving dogs and cats, and provide a unique way to ease the symptoms of dementia without drugs. During the study, participants visited horses on a farm once a week for a month, so that every participant had four visits total. They groomed and bathed the horses, walked them and fed them buckets of grass. There was a clear improvement in dementia-related behavior among the participants who visited the farm. To track behavior, the researchers used a scoring system called the Modified Nursing Home Behavior Problem Scale, in which staff rated the frequency with which the participants fidgeted, resisted care, became upset or lost their tempers on days they went to the farm or stayed at the senior center. On a scale of zero to four — zero meaning the client never engaged in the problem behavior, and four meaning that they always engaged in it — scores for the participants who went to the farm were an average of one point lower than the scores for their peers who stayed at the center. To read more about this study, click here.