Saúde e alterações comportamentais de animais de equoterapia

The animal welfare has become a huge social concern and it is a must to identify the factors that might display some influence on it. Hence, the present study aimed to evaluate the aspects related to handling, sanity, and behavior of animals destined to equine-assisted therapy. A questionnaire was fashioned and distributed to various equine-assisted therapy centers (n=127), which were affiliates of ANDE-BRASIL (the institution that rules such activity, throughout Brazil). Only 27 of them answered it. Within the studied factors that were taken into consideration, we must mention the incidence of diseases, veterinary assistance, sanitary control (vermifuge and vaccines), control of animal entrance, incidence of colic and behavioural issues. Then, it was observed that there was a low incidence of disorders since 14.28% got sick once every three months. In 40.74% of the equine-assisted therapy centers, the veterinarian would pay a monthly-visit resulting in low incidence of diseases (14.81%). It was observed and efficient sanitary contro, since 85.18% of animals were annually vaccined and 70.27% were vermifuged within proper intervals. Some premises worked as equestrian centers and the equine-assisted therapy was a parallel activity. It is therefore important to have control of animal entrance through obligatory notification trials. A good number of equine-assisted therapy centers presented this control by requiring examinations and vaccinations (40.74%). It was checked the oral health (74.07%) aiding the digestion of feed and reducing the cases of colic (59.26%). Hooves were cleaned and hoofing occured into proper intervals. As for behavior analysis, the animals had at least a two-hour interval of physical contact with one another (74.07%), which favoured the lack of stereotypes and aggressiveness. Results show that forming a team with knowledge regarding horses, as well as the veterinarian assiduity contributed to the good sanitary management within the assessed centers.