The practicability of horticultural therapy for asthmatic children: Program description

Horticultural therapy (HT) has been provided for long-stay asthmatic children as a supplemental holistic treatment to complement other treatments at the Osaka Prefecture Medical Center for Respiratory and Allergic Disease. This paper describes the HT program and reports results from this program as practiced with children ages four to fourteen, from April 2003 to May 2004. There are three factors emphasized in our program: interacting with nature, involvement with others, and raising nature, that is, learning to nurture and grow plants. This foundation has produced good results; it allows asthmatic children who have not previously experienced nature, to relax and harmonize with others, learn teamwork skills, willingly experience new challenges, and learn to express their own feelings towards nature and towards other people.