Motor Skill Proficiency After Equine-assisted Activities and Brain-building Tasks

Twenty-five youth completed the same 32-week protocol that was separated into 4, 8-week blocks, in the following order: a) control, b) EAA-only, c) washout, and d) GaitWay block (EAA and brain building activities). Before and after each block, motor skills were assessed using the Short Form of the Bruininks-Oseretsky Test of Motor Proficiency-Version 2 (BOT-2). Seven youth continued with the GaitWay intervention for one additional year, and the BOT-2 Short Form was also administered following this intervention. A repeated-measures analysis-of-variance was performed to compare BOT-2 subtest and overall scores between interventions. A significance of .05 was used. Manual dexterity was higher at Post-Washout versus Pre-Control (p = .018) and Post-Control (p = .024), and at Post-GaitWay versus Pre-Control (p = .037). Upper-limb coordination was higher Post-GaitWay versus Post-Control (p = .050). When compared to Pre-Control, strength was higher at Post-EAA (p = .028) and at Post-GaitWay (p = .015). Overall scores were higher at Post-GaitWay when compared to Pre-Control (p = .003) and Post-Control (p = .009). Among the seven participants who participated in the 1-year follow-up GaitWay motor skills were maintained for one year following the Post-GaitWay testing session. A combination of EAA and brain building activities may be an effective therapeutic modality to improve and maintain motor skill proficiency in youth with ND.