Aquatic Exercise Therapy/Halliwick Concept of Swim Therapy

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Aquatic Exercise Therapy/Halliwick Concept of Swim Therapy

Lecturer: Aoife Ni Mhuiri

Aquatic Exercise Therapy is an elective module in APA  which approximately 10 students take in the second half  of their BSc year. It involves the use of Aquatic Exercises  to meet therapeutic goals in order to assist in rehabilitation and to increase physical activity. In this module, students learn about the physical properties of water such as  relative density, buoyancy, hydrostatic pressure,  turbulence, drag and how these properties may be  harnessed in order to develop effective aquatic exercise programmes to influence various aspects of physical structure and function such as muscle strength,  muscle tone, joint range of motion, balance,  coordination, walking ability, cardiovascular endurance etc.

Physiotherapists at Kerry General Hospital, HSE Kerry Community Based Physiotherapists or GPs in the Kerry area refer individual children or adults with physical disabilities whom they feel would benefit from water based exercise to the programme. The referring physiotherapist/doctor directs the student with regard to the therapeutic goals of the programme for each patient. The students work on a one to one basis in the water with the patients and implement an individually tailored exercise programme under the supervision of a chartered physiotherapist (Aoife Ní MhuirÍ) for a period of 10 weeks. The water based exercise programme aims to increase physical activity levels by gaining improvements in various aspects of structure and function such as strength, flexibility, balance, coordination, motor control and gait. For many of the patients who participate in this programme, the individual attention and tuition provided by the students can have the added benefits of increasing water confidence and swim ability. This can lead to longer term benefits for patients of increased participation in swimming activities and water exercise.

The Halliwick Concept of Swim Teaching or Swim Therapy first introduced to the APA programme at ITTralee in 2004, still continues to develop and expand. Currently in APA at ITTralee, the Halliwick Concept is used every week with a group of seven young children with autism, who are referred to the programme by the Occupational Therapists with Kerry Autism Services and a group of eight children with Developmental Coordination Disorder who are referred to the programme by the HSE Kerry Community Occupational Therapists. It is also used alongside other swim teaching techniques for a group of adults with learning difficulties and as a therapeutic technique in the Aquatic Exercise Therapy Module for adults and children with physical disabilities.