Foals Need Specific Pain Ethogram, Scientists Say

Equine researchers are encouraging the creation of a pain ethogram just for foals. Drs. Johannes van Loon, Nicole Verhaar, Els van den Berg, Sarah Ross and Janny de Grauw have found that foals express pain differently than their adult counterparts. They feel creating a pain-related facial expression scale unique to foals will assist with their welfare. It's important for people caring for foals to recognize when they are experiencing problems, as well as to assist them in managing pain and determining when pain-relieving drugs are working.

To test their theory, the scientists took 60-second videos of 20 foals that were between one day and six months old that had had diagnosed painful conditions like colic, post-operative pain or an injury. They also took video before and after pain medications were administered.

They showed the videos to three observers who didn't know which foals were healthy and which were not, or if they had received pain medication. The observers, a senior anesthetist and two of his vet students, had undergone a two-day training to identify equine facial expressions and what they mean.

It was discovered that though foals and adult horses shared some of the pain-related expressions, like holding their ears back and tightening their eyelids, major differences were also observed.

Painful foals did not:

  • Show the whites of their eyes when they are in acute pain, like adult horses do. This is most likely because foals show the whites of their eyes all the time as they look around.
  • Exhibit a flehmen response when in acute pain—it's actually healthy foals that were more likely to curl their lip as they explore their environment.
  • Grind their teeth, even when they have them.

However, foals in pain did smack their lips, which painful adult horses don't do, though it isn't understood why.

Each observer had similar findings when watching each video. This indicates that that with basic training, horse owners and caretakes can easily assess pain in foals in their care. The scientists suggest that more research is needed to confirm the pain-related behaviors of foals. The team hopes to develop ethograms specific to types of acute pain, like musculoskeletal or colic pain, as well as for chronic pan.

Read the study here.

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Majority Of Equine Owners Cannot Detect Lameness

A new study shows that the vast majority of horse owners cannot determine if a horse is lame under saddle. However, scientists note that owners who pay close attention to equine behavior may pick up on clues that the horse is in pain even if they can't determine if it's lame while being ridden, reports The Horse.

The ridden horse pain ethogram (RHpE) is a list of 24 behaviors that have been scientifically confirmed to relate to pain; when the pain is removed, the behaviors disappear. The behaviors include things like pain-related facial expressions and pinning of the ears for at least five seconds. Lame horses showed at least one-third of the behaviors included in the ethogram.

Dr. Sue Dyson and a team of scientists applied the ethogram to 60 riding horses in the United Kingdom. The horses were given lameness exams and checked for saddle fit. They were then assessed for the presence of absence of the 24 behaviors listed in the ethogram while being ridden by their regular riders; all riders believed their horses were sound.

The study showed that 73 percent of the horses showed subtle, intermittent lameness in one or more legs; more than 50 percent of horses demonstrated a gait abnormality like bunny hopping or not stepping underneath themselves at the canter.

Lameness was strongly linked to a RHpE score of eight or more. The most-common behaviors included pinning the ears for at least five seconds, staring intently for at least five seconds, dragging the back feet or stumbling repeatedly.

Dyson says that riders missing lameness in their horses is not indicative of lack of attention, but more reflective of their lack of training in recognizing pain-related behaviors. Riders who learned to ride in lesson programs may have always ridden horses that were exhibiting pain-related behaviors, but were not taught that the behaviors indicated discomfort.

Dyson says owners and riders must become more educated to recognize pain-related behaviors and understand that the demonstration of eight or more of the behaviors indicated that the horse is in pain.

Read more at The Horse.

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