A physiotherapist from Russia has come up with a delightful idea for encouraging exercise for young people with CF. For some time now, Alena Scherbakova, a physiotherapy specialist at the Moscow CF Center, has been working with young CF patients aged 13 to 22 years. Indoors in winter and outdoors in summer, the lucky participants have been riding horses for 3 to 4 one hour sessions per week. Two of the patients also assist with the care of the horses.

All 8 patients have now completed a course of varying duration and have been surveyed and measurements of lung function, physical tolerance and IgE, IgG, aspergilus taken three times. Measurements were taken before and directly after the commencement of the course, and finally a month after completion.

Some interesting results were obtained, but because of small numbers, and very limited funding, additional study subjects and more detailed analysis of the data are necessary before publication of the full report. Alena presented details about this clinical study using hippotherapy (therapeutic horse riding) for CF patients at the 29th European CF conference in June 2006. Her presentation resulted in considerable interest from colleagues worldwide. However, because there were obvious benefits to patients, such as pleasure in participation as well as no side effects, Alena believes that it is possible to recommend hippotherapy for some patients with CF who have reasonable access to horses. For details of the program Alena can be contacted via email: ascherbakova(at)list.ru