Rood and Riddle Equine Hospital | Horse Racing Free Tips

Ask Your Veterinarian Presented By Kentucky Performance Products: How Do Crushed Heels Happen?

Veterinarians at Rood and Riddle Equine Hospital answer your questions about sales and healthcare of Thoroughbred auction yearlings, weanlings, 2-year-olds and breeding stock.

Question: How do crushed heels happen, and how might they impact an athletic horse (racehorse or sport horse)?

Dr. Scott Fleming: The modern Thoroughbred has been continuously refined for speed and this is reflected in the light, often thinner walled hooves they possess. A lighter hoof is more susceptible to forces acted on it at speed and can manifest itself in hoof deformation and eventual dysfunction of anatomical structures in the caudal or “back” part of the hoof. Crushed or significantly underrun heels are a hoof conformation fault encountered in all breeds, but very common in the Thoroughbred.

This condition typically develops over time and can be prevalent by early adulthood. There are varying degrees of crushed heels. Depending on the observer, you can describe the degree of heel dysfunction as “low heels” being milder and “crushed” being more severe. Crushed heels can be seen by the eye, but hidden within the hoof, there are often changes that take advanced imaging such as radiography, CT, or MRI to define. Often, crushed heels are accompanied by negative palmar (forelimb) or plantar (hindlimb) angles of the coffin bone, a broken back hoof-pastern axis, and degradation of the digital cushion which is the lifeblood of caudal hoof function.

A hoof is a functioning framework of bone, soft tissue and hoof wall/sole keratin all working together to support and provide traction for the horse. This highly specialized unit must endure tremendous load and stress whether at rest or speed. Proper development from an early age is critical to maintaining a healthy hoof into and throughout adulthood. Timely and attentive hoof care early in life along with activity providing impact/concussion while growing are very important factors for development. The wings of the coffin bone are very short in early life and grow caudally as the horse matures. Strong healthy wings are critical for maintaining health in the back of the hoof as they share load with the digital cushion. We often see underdeveloped or resorbing coffin bone wings with crushed/low heels.

Crushed heels can significantly impact performance through unsoundness or physical breakdown of the hoof with heel or quarter cracks. Often, these horses are heel sore and may have bruising or “corns” present. Low heels or negative palmar/plantar angles also increase stress that can lead to soft tissue injury further up the limb. A good physical exam of the hoof is an integral part of diagnosing a problem and formulating a treatment plan. While prevention is the best medicine, therapeutic shoeing/trimming protocols including bar shoes, sole support, and addressing mechanical needs of the hoof can all help with this problem. Unfortunately, the effects can often linger if severe.

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Scott Fleming, originally from Northeast Texas, grew up riding Western performance Quarter Horses and working with cattle. Upon graduating from high school, Fleming attended farrier school and maintained a quarter horse centric farrier business in Northeast and central Texas until moving to Lexington. He also served in the Marine Corps Infantry for four years.

Fleming graduated from veterinary school at Texas A&M University in 2013. He then completed an internship at Rood & Riddle in 2013-2014, continued at the hospital as a fellow, and is currently an associate veterinarian at Rood & Riddle.

Outside of Rood & Riddle, Fleming enjoys spending time on the farm with his wife, Tina and their two children, Callie and Case. A special interest for Dr. Fleming is participating in Equitarian Initiative trips to Central America to help working equids in the region.

Do you have a question for a veterinarian that you'd like to see in Ask Your Vet? Email natalie at paulickreport.com

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Q&A With Leader In Equine Anesthesia

Dr. John Hubbell is considered one of the most experienced equine anesthesiologists in the industry. Currently the chief of anesthesia at Rood and Riddle Equine Hospital in Lexington, Ky., Hubbell was interviewed by The Horse to learn more about equine sedation and anesthesia.

Hubbell told The Horse that the sedatives in use today include xylazine, acepromazine, detomidine, romifidine, and butorphanol, which were developed between the 1970s and 1990s. Prior to the introduction of these drugs, physical restraints were often used in many medical procedures.

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Hubbell reported that the sedatives used today take effect within three to five minutes. Adult horses often remain standing, even when heavily sedated.

With today's lessened reliance on physical restraints, the safety of the horse and the people surrounding him is heightened.

Though anesthesia is the safest it's ever been, there are still risks associated with laying the horse down on its side. Horses that are older (over 17 to 20 years old), those that are large, and those that aren't used to being handled are at the greatest risk of anesthesia complications. Horses in the last two categories, especially, can be difficult to help stand after anesthesia.

Hubbell said procedures that use short-term anesthesia, where the horse is recumbent for 20 to 30 minutes, do not present as many potential issues as procedures which require horses to be under anesthesia for more than 90 minutes.

There are no breed-specific dosing protocols, but Hubbell has found that American Saddlebreds and draft horses often need smaller doses of detomidine or xylazine as compared to Appaloosas, Arabians and Mustangs.

Hubbell has also found that the atmosphere in which he's performing the procedure will affect how much sedation is required. He noted that horses which have been handled regularly and that are taught to behave often require smaller doses of sedative.

PR Back Ring Fasig-Tipton July Yearling Sale: Back To The Summer Sale’s Roots

CLICK HERE TO READ THIS ISSUE OF THE PR BACK RING

The latest issue of the PR Back Ring is now online, ahead of the Fasig-Tipton July Selected Yearling Sale.

The PR Back Ring is the Paulick Report's new bloodstock newsletter, released ahead of every major North American Thoroughbred auction. Seeking to expand beyond the usual pdf presentation, the Back Ring offers a dynamic experience for bloodstock content, heavy on visual elements and statistics to appeal to readers on all platforms, especially mobile devices.

Here is what's inside this issue…

CLICK HERE TO READ THIS ISSUE OF THE PR BACK RING

Lead Feature: The Fasig-Tipton July Sale represented a return to its roots for the auction company in the 1970s. Myra Lewyn traces the sale's early years, and the flashpoints that have defined (and saved) the summer sale over the decades.
Stallion Spotlight: Chris Knehr of Lane's End on champion West Coast, whose first foals are yearlings of 2021.
Ask Your Veterinarian Presented By Kentucky Performance Products: Drs. Katy Dern and Alyssa Ball of Rood and Riddle Equine Hospital explain when and why Intra-articular medication or “joint injection” might be needed for a horse, and how to determine the proper frequency for treatment.
American Graded Stakes Standings Presented By Muirfield Insurance: The racing world lost Prince Khalid bin Abdullah Al Saud earlier this year, but his Juddmonte Farms operation has continued to make an impact with its graded stakes horses through the first half of 2021, led by Grade 1 winner Juliet Foxtrot.
Second-Crop Sire Watch: A list of stallions whose second crops of yearlings are represented in the Fasig-Tipton July catalog.

CLICK HERE TO READ THIS ISSUE OF THE PR BACK RING

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Ask Your Veterinarian Presented By Kentucky Performance Products: Identifying And Managing White Line Disease

Veterinarians at Rood and Riddle Equine Hospital answer your questions about sales and healthcare of Thoroughbred auction yearlings, weanlings, 2-year-olds and breeding stock.

Question: What is white line disease (WLD) and how can it be managed?

Dr. Raul Bras: Horses' hooves are subjected to a variety of influences that can impact soundness, including breed, limb conformation, and environment, which can change the shape of a foot. The function of the hoof can be affected by the environment, discipline, exercise, and farriery. The hoof has the ability to respond relative to its structural characteristics, its natural tolerance of the mechanical challenges, or by adaptation with changes in growth rate and shape. External alterations of the hoof capsule can be evident to the astute eye. However, many crucial changes go unnoticed until lameness or other problems are evident.

Many foot-related lameness involves hoof capsule distortions. Hoof capsule distortions occur when the tensile, compressive, or shearing forces on the hoof exceed the capacity of the hoof capsule components to withstand them. There are three basic situations in which the loading capacity of a structure can be exceeded: normal load on an abnormal structure, abnormal load on a normal structure, and abnormal load on an abnormal structure. The latter is a more reliable recipe for distortion and perhaps outright destruction of the compromised component.

WLD is a syndrome associated with structural defects of specific parts of the hoof and is characterized by progressive hoof wall separation that occurs within the non-pigmented Stratum Medium layer of the hoof wall. WLD describes a set of symptoms, rather than one specific cause of those symptoms.

The name of white line disease should not be confused with the anatomical white line that is visible around the edges of a horse's sole. Rather, it deals with the non-pigmented (or “white”) layer of the hoof wall. The hoof capsule's horn is made of three layers: the stratum externum is the stronger, denser layer of tubules that are pigmented in black feet. The stratum medium is nonpigmented. has a less dense configuration of horn tubules. stratum internum (inner layer) is the laminae and its blood supply that anchors the coffin bone to the wall.

WLD is often confused with laminitis, as the clinical and radiographic evidence are similar with a few key differences. In WLD, the separation seen in the foot will originate from the solar surface, whereas in laminitis, the separation starts in the dermal lamellae and continues distally. The air density line of WLD invades the white softer part of the wall via small breaks in the ground surface, and goes unnoticed for long period of time as the horse shows no evidence of discomfort until the capsular rotation reduces sole depth to a painful level. Capsule rotation occurs within the horn wall with WLD, and within the laminae with laminitis.

WLD has an air density lesion that extends from the ground surface and can have irregular borders, often with considerable debris filling the defect. Laminitis has capsule rotation that occurs within the laminae, and the gas line does not extend to the ground surface even when the coffin bone has penetrated the sole. Only after weeks to months from onset does the defect communicate with the ground surface.

The venogram can provide key information to veterinarians and farriers when diagnosing either laminitis or WLD, as it allows them to see areas that are deprived of blood flow.

WLD and laminitis can occur simultaneously when either is very chronic in nature.

The syndrome was first described by Drs. Ric Redden and Al Gabel in the 1970s after they observed that this defect involved the non-pigmented part of the horn. Biomechanical tests have shown that the non-pigmented portion of the stratum medium is the least rigid area of the hoof wall and has the highest water content, which could play a role in the expression of white line disease.

Redden observed that when WLD happens in one foot only, it tends to be in the hoof with a steeper profile or a club foot shape. Additionally, other researchers found a connection between the symptoms of WLD and a fungal infection called onychomycosis. Since then, we have learned the fungus is probably common in equine hooves but isn't present in all cases of WLD. Additional research has searched for an association between symptoms and different types of bacteria, the theory being the symptoms may be a sign of a bacteria that destroys hoof horn. Of course, like fungi, bacteria are also very common in a horse's environment and the bacteria that have been studied seem to be present in some cases of WLD, but not all of them. It seems more likely that bacteria are secondary opportunists which add more damage to a weakened hoof wall but aren't the main cause of damage

As with many other types of foot-related lameness, prevention is much more effective than treatment. Prevention begins with careful observation. It is important that detrimental changes in the foot be recognized early and dealt with appropriately while there is still a chance to preserve the integrity of the foot. Failure to understand the normal structure and function of the equine foot and to manage the foot and the horse accordingly can have deleterious effects.

Treatment for WLD varies from sheer mechanics to wall removal and debridement of the affected areas. Mechanical benefits that can produce medical benefits appear to be a major key to therapeutic and pathological shoeing. A well-made strategic plan based on the basic mechanical requirements of the foot can greatly improve the outcome and success of many podiatry cases. Understanding the basics principles of podiatry allows the veterinarian and farrier to aid in the prevention of foot related lameness, maintain a sounder horse, and implement therapeutic shoeing when necessary.

Dr. Raul Bras is a certified journeyman farrier and veterinarian in the podiatry department at Rood and Riddle Equine Hospital. A member of the International Equine Veterinarian Hall of Fame, Bras graduated from Ross University and completed the farrier program at Cornell University. He is a partner at Rood and Riddle.

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