Relationship of gait and pain ethogram in riding horses
A Ridden Horse Pain Ethogram (RHpE) comprising a total of twenty-four behaviors, has been developed to facilitate the identification of musculoskeletal pain.
This study used a convenience sample of sixty sport and riding horses used in regular work who were assumed to be in work comfortably by their owners. All horses performed a purpose-designed dressage-type test of 8.5 minutes duration in walk, trot and canter, with their normal rider.
Using video recordings, the ethogram scale was applied restrospectively to show seventy-three percent of horses were lame, less than or equal to a two out of eight on one or more limbs, and forty-seven percent had gait abnormalities in the canter.
The effect of horse age, breed, sex, work-discipline, epaxial muscle hypertonicity or pain, an ill-fitting saddle, rider skill score, the presence of lameness or gait abnormalities in canter on the ethogram score was assessed using Poisson regression.
Two variables were retained in the final analysis, rider skill score as a continuous variable (p < 0.001), and lameness (p = 0.008), with an ethogram score ≥8 as a good indicator in the presence of musculoskeletal pain.
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