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  Discussion on Warmblood and navicular changes
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Member:
Kiwi

Posted on Sunday, Jul 17, 2005 - 8:51 pm:

I had my young Han. warmblood gelding come back after a prepurchase exam diagnosed with navicular changes in one foot only. The prepurchase vet took digital pictures that showed a clean left foot but many changes (lesions) on the right. He is not lame and does not test positive to hoof testers. I was perplexed since I raised this horse myself and was told that he has great feet and never took a lame step in his life. I went on the web to find out that warmbloods tend to have changes in their navicular bones and this is a common feature that does not equate lameness in the future. Are there any scientific findings to support this? Or is this a myth? What should my next step be? Confirm with own xrays? I was also told that comparing digital to traditional xrays are like apples to oranges so I need to be consistent and get more digital xrays. Any insight would be helpful.
Thanks in advance
Moderator:
DrO

Posted on Monday, Jul 18, 2005 - 6:45 am:

The comment about comparing digital to traditional radiographs is nonsense and a good set of traditional radiographs should be acceptable. After all if digital radiography is turning up all kinds of new lesions: what is the significance of these findings.

If you cannot get a hold of a set of the original radiographs, digital copies are easy to make, then I suppose you will need to get a set for yourself to see what is going on. Until we know what lesions are present it is difficult to know what the next step should be. It is commonly felt that larger breeds have more lesions but I don't know of any published studies on this.
DrO
Moderator:
DrO

Posted on Monday, Jul 18, 2005 - 6:53 am:

No sooner did I write it that I found this paper. While it does not study the question of the comparative incidence they note that warmbloods in their study do have an increased incidence but were not as troubled by it as TB's:

Equine Vet J. 2003 Jun;35(4):375-81.
Retrospective evaluation of equine prepurchase examinations performed 1991-2000.

van Hoogmoed LM, Snyder JR, Thomas HL, Harmon FA.

Department of Surgical and Radiological Sciences, School of Veterinary Medicine, University of California, Davis, California 95616, USA.

REASONS FOR PERFORMING STUDY: Prepurchase examinations of horses are used increasingly as a means of evaluating future soundness. Data is lacking in the literature of the radiographic findings and results of the lameness examination of comprehensive prepurchase examinations. OBJECTIVE: To summarise the clinical and radiographic findings of prepurchase examinations and determine if radiographic findings correlated with the lameness examination and sale outcome. METHODS: Records of 510 cases were reviewed, radiographs evaluated and grades assigned the navicular bone, distal phalanx, and tarsus. Follow-up information on the horse status was obtained by telephone interviews for 173 horses. RESULTS: Thoroughbred geldings represented the most common breed and sex, mean age 8 years, mean asking price 12,439.40 dollars, and 52.8% were lame. Radiography was the most common diagnostic procedure performed (61.6%), with views of the front feet requested most often (86.6%) followed by the tarsi (68.1%). Grade 1 was most common for the navicular bone while Grade 2 predominated for the distal phalanx. The number of sound horses decreased as grades became more severe. For the tarsi, Grades 0 and 1 were most common for the proximal intertarsal and distal intertarsal/metatarsal joints, respectively. Horses with significant tarsal changes were still able to compete at their expected level. With respect to the radiographic examination, the mean +/- s.d. grade of the horses which were not lame at follow-up was 1.2 +/- 0.9 for the navicular bone and 15 +/- 0.8 for the third phalanx. The mean +/- s.d. grade of sound horses for the distal intertarsal joint was 0.7 +/- 0.6 and 1.14 +/- 0.8 for the tarsometatarsal joint. Horses for which owner follow-up was available and which had a Grade 3 score were also evaluated. For the navicular bone, 17/31 with a Grade 3 remained in active use at follow-up and for the distal phalanx 21/27 were in active use. For the distal intertarsal and tarsometatarsal joints, 20/21 with a Grade 3 were still in active use. CONCLUSIONS: Prepurchase examinations can have a significant effect on the outcome of the sale. For the navicular bone and distal phalanx, higher grades were associated with lameness. In contrast, higher grades in the tarsus were less likely to be associated with lameness. Warmbloods tended to have more extensive changes in the navicular bone and distal phalanx relative to Thoroughbreds but were not as lame. POTENTIAL RELEVANCE: Radiographic changes detected in the navicular bone, distal phalanx and tarsus should be interpreted with consideration to the clinical examination.
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