Efeito da Terapia Assistida por Animais nos aspectos motores e interação socioafetiva de um adolescente com paralisia cerebral: um estudo de caso

Abstract

AbstractIntroduction:Cerebral palsy is a non-progressive injury sequel which occurredin the pre-, peri- or post-natal affecting the central nervous system development.The Animal-Assisted Therapy (AAT) is presented as an alternative treatmentcomplementary to physical therapy where the animal is part of this, althoughstill unknown by most people.Objective:To analyze the effect of the TAA onissues related to motor performance and socioaffective interaction of a teen withcerebral palsy.Method:A research with quantitative and qualitative approachwas conducted. The subject was a teenager with quadriparetic spastic cerebralpalsy. The instruments used were the Gross Motor Function Measure (GMFM-88) and a semi-structured interview adapted to adolescents’ legal guardian.Results:We identified improvement in motor performance with pre- (52.53%)and post-therapy (58.32%) scores; and in the socioaffective issues reported bythe participant’s mother in the interviews.Conclusion:It was observed that theintervention used is a therapeutic resource capable of improving the teenager’smotor performance as well as socioaffective issues