Equine Athlete: Week 5-6

Hello from Wilmington Ohio. Equine Athlete will be on the road for the next couple weeks. We arrived here on Monday for the AHA Region 13 Championships. Next Monday we will be headed to Lexington Kentucky for Region 14 Championships. With that, I’d like to fill you in on what a day at the shows consists of. We arrive to the facilities as everyone is hauling in for the week, in case of any travelling issues. There have been a few the last couple of days, just some minor colics, which we have treated with fluids, and electrolytes. Aside from the general care we do various treatments related to sports medicine. We provide shockwave therapy, therapeutic ultrasound, laser therapy, chiropractic adjustments, and much more.

Horse show life consists of early mornings and late nights. The different therapies that I mentioned above have to be perfectly timed out from when the horse shows. Therefore our schedule is pretty jam packed. Aside from our set schedule, we get numerous of calls for unexpected problems that we must resolve. If a lameness issue is presented we first observe if it is a three leg lameness or something less obvious. If it is a three leg lameness, there are usually four possibilities; a fracture, foreign object, abscess, or the horse is septic. We will access these horses for any wounds and palpate to find where the issue is stemming from. The majority of three leg lameness’s that I have seen this summer are from an abscess and we use hoof testers and x-rays to determine if that is the problem. If is it something less obvious, such as a suspensory or a joint issue, we will lounge the horse first followed by flexing. Flexing is a stress test used to pin point where the pain is coming from. Lastly, palpations are done to reassure the findings on the lounge line and flex test. Using what was found a treatment plan is put into place, it is always different depending on the individual. At the shows we can’t do joint injections because it have to be 7 days from when the horse shows, but we can use one of the other therapies listed above in order to make the horse more comfortable.

With that, being at a horse show is a lot of running around, we rarely get any breaks. We have been working on average 15 hour days so it can be exhausting but I am loving every minute of it and I’m learning so much!

I hope to see some more interesting cases the next couple of weeks that I will share! Stay tuned!