Neurorehabilitation Through Hippotherapy of a Brain Stroke
NCT ID: NCT04759326
Last Updated: 2024-07-31
Study Results
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Basic Information
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RECRUITING
NA
52 participants
INTERVENTIONAL
2022-04-27
2026-03-31
Brief Summary
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The aim of the study is to analyze the effect of a hippotherapy program of several cycles delivered during 22 weeks in total, on the functional and global evolution of post-stroke patients (with a score of Rankin ≥ 3 at inclusion) during the outpatient rehabilitation phase. A second purpose is to measure the impact of the intervention on the quality of life of their close caregivers.
A prospective clinical trial on the effectiveness of hippotherapy versus conventional outpatient rehabilitation alone will be carried out. The 22-weeks program includes three cycles of hippotherapy as follows: an initial 2-weeks cycle, an intermediate 1-week cycle and a final 1-week cycle. One-hour daily sessions will be conducted during each cycle exclusive additional rehabilitation care. After each cycle, the patients will have a 9-weeks rest period where they will continue their conventional therapy. A battery of clinical tests will measure both functional and psychological outcome. The primary end point will be the functional independence of the patient. The secondary end points will consider the patient's sensorimotor and cognitive function, the severity of stroke and the quality of life, as well as the caregivers' burden and quality of life.
Program evaluation is important in neurorehabilitation to ensure that patients are achieving meaningful outcomes from the care. A primary question is how do stroke patients clinically evolve after being discharged from the hospital and how stable is the achieved rehabilitation outcome. Hippotherapy optimizes brain plasticity and has a strong impact on the global rehabilitation process and functional outcome of these patients. A remaining question concerns the improvement of the caregivers' quality of life.
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Detailed Description
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Stroke is a brutal event in the course of a lifetime. It is a break in reality affecting the body and the psyche, not only for the individual but also for the family. It disrupts the many foundations that a person has built over the course of his or her life. Acceptance of the disease, medical care and its effects on daily life, global impairment, limitation of activity and restriction of participation, are a set of factors that the psyche cannot integrate at once. Following this event, the person and their caregivers must take the time to accept and rebuild themselves. A new sense of temporality is an essential factor in the management of a post-stroke patient and a question that must be addressed by the caregiver.
A body of scientific evidence has gradually emerged in recent years, reflecting the benefits of hippotherapy in various disabling neurological conditions. During hippotherapy, specific execution and repetition of a task are key elements of learning/strengthening/promoting a function and a robust backbone of neurorehabilitation through neural plasticity mechanisms. Hippotherapy is therefore slowly emerging as a cutting-edge method of neurorehabilitation. The post-injury experience is a powerful modulator of functional recovery following neurological disorders. Our method of hippotherapy has powerful effects on brain plasticity and neurological outcome. Beneficial results have been observed in a wide variety of brain disorders and include sensorimotor enhancement, cognitive enhancement, mental well-being, and delayed disease progression. Such an environment most likely promotes the synthesis of different neuroactive substances (e.g., BDNF, norepinephrine, acetylcholine, dopamine, serotonin), which reflect the level of arousal, motivation, attention, affection and emotion of a subject or directly drive the action (e.g., glutamate, or GABA). These endogenous molecules are strongly involved in the induction and maintenance of synaptic plasticity, namely long-lasting stable molecular, anatomical and functional modifications.
In this randomized interventional study, the effectiveness of neurological rehabilitation by hippotherapy will be studied and its scope compared in terms of functional recovery, autonomy and quality of life. Stroke patients will be included and treated from the end of the inpatient rehabilitation phase (starting 3-6 months post-stroke). They will be compared to a control group of patients undergoing conventional outpatient rehabilitation. Both groups will undergo the same qualitative and quantitative clinical tests. We will also compare the quality of life of the respective caregivers before and after the end of the program.
Conditions
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Study Design
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RANDOMIZED
PARALLEL
TREATMENT
SINGLE
Study Groups
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Hippotherapy treated group
The hippotherapy protocol will comprise three cycles. The first one consists of one session per day for 2 weeks allowing (i) to evaluate the patient and his neuro-functional skills, and (ii) to determine and carry out the treatment taking into account the silent barriers that may exist (PSTD, fatigue, pain, fear...) and strongly interfere with functional outcome (developing ways to overcome them). After a 9-week 'wash out' period (during which the patient consolidates the new patterns, translates them into daily activities and identifies new needs) where the patient continues his or her outpatient neurorehabilitation care, a further intermediate 1-week daily capacity building hippotherapy cycle follows. Then, after a second 9-week 'wash out' period (where the patient once again consolidates the new patterns, translates them into daily activities and identifies new needs), a final 1-week daily capacity building hippotherapy cycle will be carried out. Protocol will last 22 weeks.
Hippotherapy
Hippotherapy is an emerging specialized rehabilitation approach, performed on a specially trained horse via its movement at a walk by accredited health professionals (e.g., physicians, psychologists, physical therapists, occupational therapists, psychomotor therapists, chiropractors ...). The horse is an excellent support for temporary or consolidated disabilities, providing key elements of recovery for impairment, activity limitation, and participation restriction. It is a dynamic activity where the amplitude of movement of the patient's body transmitted by the horse is similar to the human walking (micro-movements of postural muscles). Moreover, through multimodal inputs (sensory, exteroceptive, proprioceptive, interoceptive), hippotherapy has a direct action on the individual's motor capacities and cognitive abilities. The degree of change relying on neuroplasticity is linked both to the relevance of the activity and to the intensity and frequency of the elements that constitute it.
Conventional neurorehabilitation treated group
Patients in the control group will receive standard outpatient rehabilitation treatment consisting of a program of physiotherapy (motor training, functional training), occupational therapy, language therapy, psychological and social support per week corresponding to the four weeks in which the treated group will be in hippotherapy. For the remaining 18 weeks, the treatment options for each patient, regardless of the group, will also include physiotherapy (motor training, functional training), occupational therapy, language therapy, psychological and social support.
Conventional Neurorehabilitation
The neurorehabilitation therapy is an intervention from two or more disciplines (physiotherapy, occupational therapy, social work, psychology and other related disciplines, nursing) prescribed by a medical specialist (neurologist, neurosurgeon, oncologist, physiatrist). It is designed to be patient-centered, time-limited and functionally oriented, and aims to maximize activity and participation (social inclusion) using a biopsychosocial model.
Interventions
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Hippotherapy
Hippotherapy is an emerging specialized rehabilitation approach, performed on a specially trained horse via its movement at a walk by accredited health professionals (e.g., physicians, psychologists, physical therapists, occupational therapists, psychomotor therapists, chiropractors ...). The horse is an excellent support for temporary or consolidated disabilities, providing key elements of recovery for impairment, activity limitation, and participation restriction. It is a dynamic activity where the amplitude of movement of the patient's body transmitted by the horse is similar to the human walking (micro-movements of postural muscles). Moreover, through multimodal inputs (sensory, exteroceptive, proprioceptive, interoceptive), hippotherapy has a direct action on the individual's motor capacities and cognitive abilities. The degree of change relying on neuroplasticity is linked both to the relevance of the activity and to the intensity and frequency of the elements that constitute it.
Conventional Neurorehabilitation
The neurorehabilitation therapy is an intervention from two or more disciplines (physiotherapy, occupational therapy, social work, psychology and other related disciplines, nursing) prescribed by a medical specialist (neurologist, neurosurgeon, oncologist, physiatrist). It is designed to be patient-centered, time-limited and functionally oriented, and aims to maximize activity and participation (social inclusion) using a biopsychosocial model.
Eligibility Criteria
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Inclusion Criteria
* Ischemic or haemorrhagic stroke according to ICD 10 I61-I69 (30)
* Inclusion \> 3 months post-stroke
* Deficit still existing (Rankin score ≥ 3 and ≤ 4 at inclusion)
* Existing declaration of informed consent
* Affiliation of the patient to a social security scheme
* Minimal abduction of the hip of 25 degrees bilateral with no history of hip dislocation and/or dysplasia
* Certificate of non-contraindication issued by the referring physician
Exclusion Criteria
* Global or sensory aphasia
* Neurological or psychiatric co-morbidity (other than mild-to-moderate post-stroke depression)
* Evidence of an uncontrolled seizure disorder
* Substance abuse
* History of uncontrolled pain
* History of allergic reactions to dust and/or horsehair, or severe asthma
* Overweight (≥ 110 kg)
* Contraindications to physical activity
* Inability or medical contraindication to travel to the Equiphoria Institute by personal car or taxi
* History of horse riding or hippotherapy care during the last 6 months
* Pregnant or lactating women
* Patients participating in other biomedical research or in a period of exclusion
18 Years
ALL
No
Sponsors
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Boehringer Ingelheim
INDUSTRY
Centre Hospitalier Sud Francilien
OTHER
Centre Hospitalier de Béziers
UNKNOWN
University Hospital, Grenoble
OTHER
Alliance Equiphoria
OTHER
Responsible Party
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Principal Investigators
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Manuel Gaviria, MD, PhD
Role: STUDY_DIRECTOR
Alliance Equiphoria
Hélène Viruega, ESMHL
Role: STUDY_CHAIR
Alliance Equiphoria - Institut Equiphoria
Locations
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Institut Equiphoria
La Canourgue, , France
Countries
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Central Contacts
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Facility Contacts
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References
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Other Identifiers
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2020-A03172-37
Identifier Type: -
Identifier Source: org_study_id
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