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. 2018;11(3):289-303.
doi: 10.1007/s40653-017-0187-3. Epub 2017 Aug 17.

Equine Facilitated Therapy for Complex Trauma (EFT-CT)

Tiffany M Naste  1 , Maggi Price  2 , Jane Karol  3 , Lia Martin  1 , Kathryn Murphy  1 , Jennifer Miguel  1 , Joseph Spinazzola  4   5
Affiliations

Equine Facilitated Therapy for Complex Trauma (EFT-CT)

Tiffany M Naste et al. J Child Adolesc Trauma. 2018.

Abstract

Emerging research suggests that Equine Facilitated Psychotherapy (EFP) may be beneficial for traumatized youth. In addition, complex trauma (i.e., multiple and/or prolonged developmentally adverse traumatic events which are typically interpersonal in nature) treatment research is still growing and there is a need for the development and examination of novel treatments for youth with complex trauma histories. The current article describes a promising EFP model for this population called Equine Facilitated Therapy for Complex Trauma (EFT-CT). EFT-CT embeds EFP practices within Attachment, Regulation and Competency (ARC), an extant evidence-based complex trauma treatment framework for children and adolescents. The authors provide three case studies using both observational data provided by clinicians, as well as longitudinal measures of psychosocial functioning, to illustrate the potential promise of EFT-CT. The article concludes with a discussion about implications for EFP treatment and research.

Keywords: Animal assisted therapy; Child traumatic stress; Complex trauma; Equine therapy; Trauma; Treatment.

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Conflict of interest statement

All procedures followed were in accordance with the ethical standards of the responsible committee on human experimentation [institutional and national] and with the Helsinki Declaration of 1975, as revised in 2000.Author C owns the company (farm, stables and dressage training center) where the EFP-CT model was developed and is primarily implemented. Authors A, B, D, E, F & G declare that they have no conflicts to report.Informed consent was obtained from all patients for being included in the study.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Patterns of clinical change for presented cases
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