Vet Dictionary Laminitis

Laminitis is a prevalent extremely painful condition in horses that has significant welfare implications for owners.

Vet dictionary laminitis.

Inflammation of sensitive laminae in the hoof of a horse caused by stressful events as trauma infection or parturition. Recurrent laminitis episodes are not uncommon particularly in horses with predisposing risk factors such as equine metabolic syndrome ems. Horses ponies donkeys mules and wild equids. It is often recurrent for individual horses.

Diagnosis of laminitis is typically made based on the presence of one or more classic clinical signs. The laminae hold the hoof wall to the coffin bone and during laminitis inflammation causes the connections to become weak resulting in painful separation of the hoof wall from the coffin bone. Inflammation of a lamina especially in the hoof of a horse cow or goat that is typically caused by excessive ingestion of a dietary substance as carbohydrate called also founder. The laminae suspend the distal phalanx inside the capsule formed by the hoof wall.

Chronic laminitis may also be called founder. Laminitis is a unique condition to the horse and translates to inflammation of the laminae the connective tissue of the hoof. In fact it may be that we are killing our horses with kindness. Laminitis is a failure of the attachments of the epidermal layers laminae of the hoof wall to the dermal laminae attachments of the third phalanx.

It contains authoritative guidelines for the diagnosis treatment and prevention of animal disorders and diseases. Laminitis inflammation of the lamina of the hoof is a common and potentially devastating foot problem that affects all members of the equine family. Equine laminitis is a crippling disease in which there is a failure of attachment of the epidermal laminae connected to the hoof wall from the dermal laminae attached to the distal phalanx. What is especially alarming is that some cases are preventable.

Although inflammation develops as the condition progresses inflammation does not appear to be the primary insult. It is an inflammatory condition of the tissues laminae bonding the hoof wall to pedal bone in the hoof.