15/10/2024
“The horse just has a little arthritis in his left hock, it doesn’t seem to bother him too much, he just gets a bit stiff!”
Horses are great compensators, and they will create alternative locomotive patterns to continue movement.
So, say this little bit of osteoarthritis causes a reduced range of motion of the tarsal (hock) joint. In an attempt to maintain stride length and hide this dysfunction to potential predators (because you never know when a lion could be waiting around the corner... or a flapping plastic bag!), the tarsal joint is rotated medially (inwards) during the swing phase of the stride. This results in asymmetrical & medial weight bearing through the digit. This places additional stress through medial hamstring muscles, resulting in muscle tension and trigger points. And this is all something that is potentially going on in the affected hindlimb.
A hip hike/drop can occur at corresponding phases of the stride, placing the sacroiliac joint under stress, resulting in paraspinal and asymmetrical gluteal tone/pain.
Decreased impulsion from the left hindlimb leads to increased weight bearing through the right forelimb diagonal. This can create tension and hypertrophy to the right pectoral muscles and related fascial planes.
The spiral of compensation could continue on further, affecting cervical muscles that become hypertonic as a result of weight shifting, digit shape and size, TMJ pain, head tiling, hyoid dysfunction, asymmetric tail holding...
Often it can be the case where I see a horse that is a chronic stage of compensation and it can be difficult to find the true cause especially when the horse may appear just overall “stiff”.
I liken the rehabilitation of chronic cases to peeling the layers off an onion; one layer at a time and piece by piece to unravel and rewind the compensation spiral. It is important to identify and manage the root cause, rather than just accepting it🐴
