Equine Human Interaction With Veterans

VA Salt Lake City Health Care System

Status: Active, not recruiting

Conditions: PTSD

Treatments: Behavioral: Equine Therapy; Behavioral: Therapeutic Horsemanship Program

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other; Other U.S. Federal agency

Identifiers

NCT04832815

IRB_00125426

Details and patient eligibility

About

This study has two components. The first component (Aim 1) is a randomized trial of a novel equine therapy intervention that was developed for research purposes. The second component (Aim 2) is an evaluation of outcomes from Veterans participating in an adaptive horsemanship program that is not conducted for research purposes.

Enrollment: 200 estimated patients

Sex: All

Ages: 18 to 70 years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

For Aim 1:

• Currently enrolled for services at the VA Salt Lake City Health Care System
• At least one mental health service encounter within the preceding 12 months
• Diagnosed with PTSD by a clinician within the preceding 24 months
• Have a doctor release to participate in equine activities

For Aim 2:

• Currently enrolled for services at the VA Salt Lake City Health Care System
• Have a doctor release to participate in equine activities

Exclusion criteria

• Pregnancy
• Diagnoses of a psychotic spectrum illness and/or cognitive impairment
• Physical disability that would prevent horseback riding
• Weight >= 250 lbs.
• Potentially the severity of and psychological and/or behavioral symptoms will be considered

Trial design

Primary purpose: Treatment

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

---

200 participants in 3 patient groups

Equine Therapy

Experimental group

Treatment:

Behavioral: Equine Therapy

Treatment as Usual (TAU)

No Intervention group

Therapeutic Horsemanship Program

Experimental group

Treatment:

Behavioral: Therapeutic Horsemanship Program