‘Being in tune’ is vital in a therapist-client relationship.

Lady Pollyanna FitzGerald McTimoney Animal Chiropractor

Based primarily in Oxfordshire and the borders of Wiltshire and Berkshire, Lady Pollyanna, daughter of the Duke and Duchess of Leinster, has owned her popular animal chiropractic business since qualifying with an MSc in Animal Manipulation (Chiropractic) from the McTimoney College of Chiropractic in 2022. Lady Pollyanna previously studied the science of coaching and when faced with the research element of the MSc programme, wanted to use this opportunity to understand more about the impact and intricacies of the relationships formed between animal owners and therapists. Lady Pollyanna explains, “My research topic was on client-practitioner relationships. I chose this topic because it is an important part of the treatment process that is often overlooked. I find interactions and people’s experiences fascinating and a great way to learn about the world. Through this, I can have a deeper understanding and develop as a practitioner to do better for my clients and their animals.”

To collect the information she needed, Lady Pollyanna carried out interviews with 5 female participants on their experiences with an animal chiropractor. The main themes to arise were ‘being in tune’, knowledge, trust, and communication. This novel research was interesting as although there are studies of the patient-doctor relationships in medical science, there is minimal information within the animal-owning industry. Knowledge, trust, and communication are all themes that are present in previous medical research but ‘being in tune’ was an unexpected outcome and isn’t defined in the current literature. ‘Being in-tune’ was defined in Lady Pollyanna’s research by drawing on research into personality, empathy, emotional intelligence, body language, and horse training methods and warrants further investigation to educate practitioners and improve the practitioner-client relationship and horse welfare overall.

Lady Pollyanna explains, “The research methodology I used is very time-consuming, so this in itself was tricky, but the biggest difficulty was the main finding of ‘being in-tune’ which had not been discussed in previous literature. This meant I had to draw on a vast number of areas to define it for future research.” Lady Pollyanna recently presented her research findings at the Animal Chiropractic and Rehabilitation Conference at the McTimoney College of Chiropractic.

In her day-to-day practice, Lady Pollyanna treats horses and a few dogs. Lady Pollyanna says, “I love the response animals have to treatment and the fact that I am helping them. I think one of my most rewarding moments was working with a donkey, or rather him allowing me to work on him. He had watched me treat his horse companion and when I was writing up my notes ‘asked’ me to do his neck. Since then, we have been increasing the amount of treatment he has. This donkey doesn’t like people touching him but if he isn’t treated first now, he has a tantrum! During treatment, he completely relaxes and is very cuddly. It makes my job so rewarding.” ©

Link to Lady Pollyanna’s research

For more information or to book an appointment for your animals contact Lady Pollyanna at 07988899427, email pollyannaequinesp@gmail.com or website or follow Lady Pollyanna on Instagram (@pollyannaequine) or Facebook.