Therapeutic Riding in Slovenia A Story of Achievement 2001

Slovenia is a small, relatively young country, which people often confuse with Slovakia because of the similarity in names.!t is situated in the north of the Bal- kans, between Austria, Italy, Hungary and Croatia. It has a population of 2 million.

At this year’s congress Slovenia is represented for the first time by staff of the Centre for Training of Physically Handicapped Young People, Kamnik, who are the instigators of therapeutic riding in our country.

Our Centre uses recognized educational and health programmes, wlllch are modi- fied to suit characteristics needs of the 170 physically – handicapped children and adolescents who attend our Centre. In 1997 our Centre celebrated its 50th anniversary. Initially our Centre catered for children with war injuries, later chil- dren with poliomyelitis. Today the majority of our children have cerebral palsy (37%), neuromuscular diseases (14,5%), spina bifida (13,3%), motor handicaps as a consequence of trauma (8,1 %) and other conditions (27,1 %). Our Centre consists of four independent departments: primary school, secondary school, boarding department and medical department.