Richmond Times-Dispatch Shining Lights Story

Charm spooked when she got tangled in a blanket. She kicked, bucked and rolled.

Blanket buckles sliced open her front and back legs. A knee joint in her back leg swelled to the size of a small tree trunk. She dragged both legs and could barely walk.

Things were not looking good for the palomino quarter-horse pony.

"She wouldn't let you touch her," said Charm's rider and owner, Ali Cerkez, 11, of Powhatan County. But $400 later, she and her dad, Joe, got the good news. Nothing was broken.

The veterinarian gave the 4-year-old mare a shot to calm her and a shot to prevent infection, then bandaged the wounds.

It would be weeks before the swelling went down. "She couldn't be ridden for a good while," Joe Cerkez said.

The accident was about six weeks ago. Charm shows no signs of injury. She trots, gallops -- all the normal things healthy horses do. Ali rode and jumped her within a few weeks of the injury.

"You would never know anything was wrong with her," Joe Cerkez said. "She has no scabs, all the hair has grown back."

Father and daughter attribute Charm's fast recovery to the healing power of light therapy. The method uses light-emitting diodes to deliver red and infrared lights to boost the body's natural healing process.

Light therapy originally was developed by NASA for plant-growth research in space. Now the same technology is being used to help people -- and horses.

Infrared light has been shown to increase energy in cells, relieve aches and speed healing, according to a NASA study.

Yet few people in the equestrian world have heard of light therapy. Some say it's bunk. Others say it's worth a try.

The American Association of Equine Practitioners has not taken a position on it.

"There is no evidence that it does any good," said Dr. Tom Newton, a veterinarian in Goochland County. "There are no double-blind scientific studies that say it does a thing."

Ferris Allen, a racing-industry trainer from Varina, said he is not familiar with light therapy.

"We use a lot of things -- acupuncture, magnetic therapy, shock-wave therapy. The truth is, we just want the horse to get better."

When a horse gets better, it's hard to say which therapy worked, Allen said. "Things come and go in this industry."

For Joe Cerkez, "if I didn't see it for myself, I wouldn't have believed it."

It worked like a charm, he said.

"Right after we did the lights, Charm wasn't limping," Ali said. "Oh yes, we could definitely see a big improvement."

What's more, she was calm enough for the farrier to trim her hooves without much ado. It had always been an ordeal before.

Kimberly Shaw, president of Gladstone Equine in Midlothian, scanned Charm's entire body using a comblike device to determine where the horse hurt.

The scanner emits a micro-current of electricity to measure resistance in muscle tissues. High resistance means healthy tissue. Low resistance indicates trauma.

Red and infrared lights are applied to problem spots, penetrating tissues to increase blood flow and promote healing, Shaw said.

Shaw became a believer after using the therapy on her horse, a Thoroughbred that came up lame every now and then for no ap parent reason.

Her vet told her to let Montego rest in his stall and give him aspirin and an anti-inflammatory to relieve the pain.

"After two and half months, I wasn't seeing any results," Shaw said.

She contacted Dan Sumerel, a horse handler, author and endurance horse racer in Lynchburg -- and founder of the Sumerel Therapeutic System, a light scanner and therapy system.

"I'd already spent $500," Shaw said. "For $75, I thought wouldn't it be cool if this works.

"Three days after the treatment, my horse was moving much better," Shaw said. "He was out in the pasture, frolicking and loving being out there."

Shaw bought the system to help her horse. She used it on other injured horses, then opened Gladstone Equine.

"This seemed like such a natural progression from a spiritual as well as business sense," she said.

Eventually, she would like to run a therapeutic farm to help injured horses. Ideally, a vet would be associated with the farm.

"I'm not a vet. I'm not trained to diagnose injuries and ailments," Shaw said. "But I have worked with horses since I was 6 years old."

She gave riding lessons and trained and rode other people's horses, but she gave up horses in her mid-20s. "I had to find a real job that paid real money."

She worked as a clerk at AT&T, went into telephone sales and moved in 1986 from New Jersey to Virginia.

She did marketing for a Petersburg bank, then worked at Capital One Financial Corp., which was part of Signet Bank at the time.

She lost her job there in 2002 when her marketing-analysis department was eliminated.

"Capital One had a wonderful severance package, and in my 10 years there, I was able to save money."

She toyed with doing marketing for the golf industry. She likes golf but doesn't claim to be a golfer. "I own my own set of golf clubs, if that qualifies."

The golf business wasn't going anywhere. "I still didn't see a way to make money doing horses. I didn't have a farm."

She bought Montego, her first horse, and boarded him at Mesa Vista Farm in Powhatan, a therapeutic riding farm for the disabled. She now leases about half of the farm, boarding and caring for other horses.

She met Sumerel at a clinic last summer and became the sales dealer for the Sumerel Therapeutic System in the central Virginia region.

Shaw has put lights on about 50 horses. All have shown improvement, she said. She has used them to help heal a dog with hip problems.

"I am a born skeptic," said Bruce Anderson, who works with Shaw. "You don't have to believe. It works."

Shaw, 44, and Anderson, 46, were high school friends who reconnected. Both are divorced. He moved here from their home state of New Jersey a year ago.

A long-distance runner, he uses the lights on himself to ease stiffness and soreness.

Her daughter, 15, is using it on her leg to heal a burn.

"Light therapy helps the body help itself," said Michele Schutt, a massage therapist. "That is what alternative medicine is all about." Schutt, owner of Centaur Therapeutics in Chesterfield County, is expanding her human practice to horses.

Helen Messenger, owner of Mesa Vista Farm, said light therapy helps horses with sore backs and hips, wounds and stiff joints. She uses the lights on herself for a chronic heel problem.

"It makes my heels feel better," she said. "It helps all kinds of things."

Any ideas? Staff writer Carol Hazard can be reached at (804) 775-8023 or chazard@timesdispatch.com