News Page

7th December 2004

Welcome to the News Page, whose purpose is to discuss topical subjects, to review readers’ queries and generally bring a meeting point between the world of science and the practical area of daily horse management, in other words, between theory and practice.

We invite questions, from which we will take a cross section of interesting topics, though the immediate aim is to discuss emerging news, consider new research and advise on the balance between old and new knowledge. 

Our generation marks a break with the traditional knowledge of our ancestors.  We now discount anecdotal evidence, the basis on which much essential information was accumulated through the centuries.  How to feed; how to care for; how to diagnose and treat.  We seek higher standards, but do we achieve them?  There are many reasons to suggest we struggle in this, partly as we have allowed commercialism to take over.  We often fail to distinguish between proven scientific evidence and unproven opinion, whatever its source.  The introduction of technology has compounded this and only common sense can bring reason to the situation.  Decisions on the welbeing of horses should not be dependent on commercial opportunism.

Navicular Disease

It is appropriate to take this condition as our opening subject, as it is one that has always courted controversy.  Even in days when city streets were populated with cabs and draught horses, there was a serious dispute between vets who considered it significant and those who didn’t.  There was even a failure then to agree on the meaning of x-rays that showed changes in the navicular bone.

Without going into the whole question of cause and effect, or whether or not it has ever been proven that pain in the navicular bone is capable of making a horse lame, it needs to be seen that a high percentage of ‘navicular disease’ diagnoses are incorrect.  I have been presented with many (hundreds of) horses over the years condemned as having this problem, and have yet to be convinced I have ever seen one where navicular pain was the singular cause of lameness.  While this is a single, anecdotal, opinion, it is the opinion of a clinician who has attended lame horses of virtually every type for the best part of forty years.

From an insurer’s viewpoint, diagnosis of ‘navicular disease’ is often a means of bringing an end to a chronic condition that seems insoluble and costly.  In modern parlance, there can be ‘closure’.  The animal can be put down and expenditure terminated.  Not very sensible if the opinion is wrong and the condition can be treated.

If ‘navicular disease’ doesn’t exist (even in a percentage of cases), there are serious questions to be asked about diagnosis, drug use and the effectiveness of current ‘treatments’.  As most suspected cases will be presented lame, there is clearly a problem for the animal and its owner, also the vet.  But the onus on the clinician is to find a specific cause, not rely on a dubious condition the incidence of which has got out of proportion, perhaps because it has become fashionable.

For the same reasons, research into the effectiveness of new drugs for ‘navicular disease’ will have serious limitations.  Yes, there may be changes on x-rays, but are they associated with the cause of lameness?  That is the crux of the matter.

We need to rationalise the situation now, from its very basis, and this has to begin with appropriate veterinary research as well as some soul-searching in the area of lameness teaching.

Peter Gray

PS Tell us about your navicular experiences by email and we’ll see if we can comment.

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