You Are Here: Group Homepage > Links Veterinary Group > Equestrian > My horse has laminitis
What are the causes of horse laminitis and how do I recognise when it is a problem?
Horse Laminitis is a very common disease where the sensitive tissues directly between the horn of the hoof and the tissues of the foot become inflammed and extremely painful. This means that the whole weight of the horse is being 'suspended' within the hooves by very painful tissue hence horse laminitis is a significant welfare problem to affected animals and requires aggressive and immediate treatment if we are to maximise the chances of recovery.
What are the signs of horse laminitis?
Obviously the pain felt by the horse can vary from mild discmfort with lots of shifting of weight and tenderness around the sole, to very severe pain with reluctance to actually bear weight either on individual feet or more commonly on both front feet or all four feet (with occasionally a horse which refuses to stand up from lying down).
Commonly both forefeet are affected and the horse takes up an abnormal stance with much of its weight shifted to the hindlimbs so the horse appears to be leaning backwards with its front feet held in an unusual position out to the front of the horse.
Occasionally the foot pain is diffuse and hard to see and the horse will simply appear uncomfortable and restless, maybe with excess sweating and these cases can appear to resemble abdominal pain or colic.
Long term or chronic cases will show the easily recognisable but frequently misinterpreted 'laminitis rings'. These are growth rings in the hoof which represent periods of altered horn growth. Parallel lines around the whole foot can be a normal finding in some horses. Laminitis rings however are closer together at the toe than they are at the heel due to more rapid gropwth of the hoof horn further back in the foot.
.jpg)
What causes Horse Laminitis?
Horse Laminitis can be a result of repeated trauma to sensitive feet (hard ground possibly with poor foot conformation contributing to excessive stresses and strains on the hoof wall - overgrown sidewalls and toes especially in susceptible horses). Similar problems can arise in individual feet where the opposite side is affected with something separate and painful so the horse bears more weight, over a protracted period of time, on the 'healthy' foot which then goes on to develop laminitis. Also laminitis can develop as a consequence of seemingly unrelated disease especially where bacterial infection is involved eg pneumonia, peritonitis, gastrointestinal disease.
Possibly the most common cause is due to nutritional causes. Some horses can be very susceptible to laminitis. These classically are overweight ponies which during their evolution would be surviving on a very poor diet of low quality forage. Nowadays when we look after them with lush grass and additional dry feed their metabolism is 'overloaded' and the feet develop laminitis due to a disturbance of the gut flora. Equally a horse which has uncontrolled access to high carbohydrate feedstuffs can develop acute laminitis with severe consequences.
How do we treat horse laminitis?
As soon as laminitis is suspected the owner must act quickly. After calling the vet the horse should be placed onto deep straw or shavings with minimal movement possible in order to stop any further trauma on the fragile hoof/foot boundary.
Food should also be very restricted in that a housed horse should have adlib water and solely a small ration of fibrous hay daily. An average horse will need just one 'flake' of hay during an acute episode.
The veterinary surgeon will assess the horse to firstly identify that laminitis is indeed the problem, and then start an assessment of the severity in this case. This assessment may require XRays of the feet as laminitic horses can show rotation of their pedal bones within the hoofs in severe cases. These Xrays give a very important indication of likely outcome of treatment and also allow us to measure the progress of the case wth time.
Specific treatments of cases can include supports to the feet to try to prevent or slow the pedal bone rotation as well as drugs to try to increase blood flow to the affected regions and also most importantly pain relief to alleviate the horses discomfort.
What is the likely long term outcome of laminitis?
As long as the condition is recognised quickly and aggressive veterinary treatment instigated, most horses will recover from an acute episode. These horses need strict control of grazing and additional feed supplementation as advised by the vet to prevent future relapses.
Occasionally cases of laminitis will rapidly deteriorate or will be of a severity that necessitates the humane destruction of the animal. It cannot be emphasised strongly anough that to reduce the chances of this outcome prompt and aggressive veterinary treatment must be sought in all cases.