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| THE VET'S NOTEBOOK |
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Guidelines for Detecting Lameness, Part I
by Dr. David Ramey, DVM |
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Undoubtedly, the most common reason that veterinarians are called to examine horses is because of lameness. Although all of the symptoms of lamenss cannot be described in one short article, I would like to give you some general guidelines for how to determine when a horse is lame.
A horse is considered lame when he is unwilling to put full weight on the affected limb and, thus, the most frequent indication of lameness is limping. In the most severe cases, diagnosis is easy. For instance, if a horse has a nail in his foot, he won't put his foot on the ground. Most lameness, however, is a bit more subtle. You might notice that the horse does not feel even when you ride him. He may have a shorter stride than normal, or he may be reluctant to go forward. In more severe lameness, the horse may bob his head or lift his hip in a predictable pattern.
Next, it is important to determine in which leg the horse is lame. This takes a bit of practice to see, but for now think of what you do when you limp. You don't want to walk on a sore leg, so you try to minimize the amount of weight that the sore leg carries. You do this by lifting up your hip when your sore leg touches the ground and dropping more weight on your good leg when it hits the ground. When a horse limps, he tries to minimize weight on the sore leg in the same way.
In the front legs, lameness is most commonly manifested by a bobbing of the head and neck. When a horse limps on his front leg, he lifts his head and neck up when the lame leg hits the ground and drops his head down when the sound leg hits the ground. You can often hear the difference in weight bearing when a horse's good leg hits the ground harder than his sore leg.
Lameness of the hind leg is a bit more tricky to detect. The same basic principle holds, however, because the horse is trying to take weight off the bad leg. In the hind leg, a horse may show lameness by extending his head a neck forward, stretching to pull weight off his back leg. Stretching forward tightens the muscles of the back, and back soreness frequently accompanies hind limb lameness. The horse may lift his hip when the affected leg hits the ground to minimize weight on the sore spot.
A horse may also change the way in which he carries his leg. For instance, problems of the hock may cause a horse to swing his leg more under his body than normal. Generally, the horse has more ways of avoiding normal weight bearing on hind limbs than on the front limbs and, for this and other reasons, hind limb problems are freqently more obscure and harder to assess.
Front limb lameness is more common than lameness in the hind limbs because the horse carries approximately 65% of his weight on his front limbs. More weight equals more stress and more potential problems. Approximately 70% of all lamenesses are associated with the hooves, because the majority of the stress on the limbs is taken by the hoof.
Once you have determined that a horse is lame and have called in a veterinarian, how do we diagnose the type of lameness? The single most important method is to give the horse a thorough examination, which involves an inspection of the horse for signs of inflamation--redness, swelling, heat and pain. Redness is hard to detect on a horse, so we concentrate on the last three signs.
Because we have a complete knowledge of the basic anatomy of the leg and know what a normal leg should look like, we compare the differences between the lame horse and a normal horse. Any questionable areas are examined by any one of a variety of methods, which will be discussed in Part II of this article. For now, watch horses carefully to see if you can detect lameness.
© 1998 by Dr. David W. Ramey. All Rights Reserved.
Dr. David Ramey is a 1983 graduate of Colorado State University. He is the author of numerous books and articles on horse health, including Horsefeathers: Facts vs. Myths About Your Horse's Health and the Concise Guide series on equine health care. He can be reached at (818) 953-8528. |
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