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Re: Heart Rates/soundness





On Sun, 28 Jun 1998, T J Habberley wrote:

> in the UK horses are not allowed to start set speed or endurance rides with
> a heart rate above 64 bpm. This isnt up to the vets its the rule ,
> period.We also dont have 'degrees' of lameness heare. Your horse is ever
> 100 % sound or not allowed to start or complete .

I used to think this until I realized that there are virtually no horses
on the face of the planet who are "100% sound" if you define sound to
mean, "has no (observable) gait irregularity."

Whether a gait irregularity is observable or not depends upon the
observer.  Additionally, not all gait irregularities are caused by pain,
nor are all gait irregularities affected by exercise.  So to say that no
horse with a gait irregularity is allowed to compete in endurance because
the horse "might" be "lame" and the exercise might be bad for it....would
put every horse out of endurance competition if _I_ were the observer,
since I can pick up even the most subtle of gait irregularities.

Which has led me to the conclusion that there are indeed "degrees" of
"lameness."  If you will note, the way the degrees are laid out (grade
1-5??) has to do with the extent to which an irregularity is observable.

In the parlance of dressage trainers (and here I will quote from the book
"Effective Horsemanship" in his chapter on "The Straight Horse")

"The horse, like the human being, is born stronger, more dextrous, more
adroit, on one side than on the other" some sypmptoms of this assymetry
are, "..He carries one hind quarter to the side and slightly to the left
of the other...One hind leg is stronger than the other and he favors one
diagonal and engages one hind more than the other...His strides are
unequal."

These too, are signs of incipient "lameness."

He goes on to say in the secttion on 'Ways to Straighten the HOrse' "Let
me say straght away that however hard you try, you will not get your horse
absolutely straight, any more than you yourself could become completely
ambidextrous at golf or any other game."

To the most proficient of observers, this assymetry can be seen as a gait
irregularity.  To determine whether these gait irregularities are actually
lameness...is not so simple.  

SO I have come to the conclusion that it doesn't make any sense to talk
about horses being either 100% sound or not...wwith no discussion of
degrees being meaningful.

For me, it is to the benefit of endurance horses if vets make note of
their observations with regards to gait irregularities on vet cards so
that gait irregularities can be monitored by the vet staff over the course
of the ride to determine whether they indicate that the horse is truly
"lame" and needs to be removed from competition.

To remove every horse with a gait irregularity from competition would be
to remove every horse.  To choose some "degree" as being meaningful and
make no note of irregularities that fall below this degree is to loose
valuable information with regards to determining the actual "soundness" of
a horse.

> High pulse rates are not neccessarily meaningless at the start of a ride.
> yes it might be due to excitement, rattley tape atc. Howver it may also be
> down to an over stressed horse whose had a bad journey to a ride and
> sholudnt be stressed further, a precurser to serious heart problems or due
> to an injury the rider has over looked/ignored in  their keeness to
> compete.So how CAN A VET DIFFERENTIATE BETWEEN THIS WITHOUT KNOWING YOUR
> INDIVIDUAL HORSE PERSONALLY . bETTER TO BE ON THE SAFE SIDE FOR THE HORSES
> SAKE ?

If we take the "better to be on the safe side for the horse's sake" to
it's logical conclusion....the ultimate "safe side" is to not start any
horses at all...since they all may have incipient problems that cannot be
differentiated by a vet without knowing the individual horse personally.

>  Dont want to sound harsh about this but have heard of a very good horse
> dropping dead at a ride recently who had an 'odd' hear tate pre ride . Not
> a very nice experience for any one involved.

To me there is a big difference between an 'odd' heart rate and a 'high'
heart rate (although both can be caused by flapping flaggs or general
excitement).

I don't know if Windy's heart rate would be below the 64 maximum pre-ride
since she won't stand still for long enough for anybody to actually take
it :), and the interesting thing about her is that the more tired she
becomes during the course of the ride, the faster she recovers.  The vets
at endurance rides can tell this about her and dismiss her high heart
rates and her long recovery times early in the ride as being meaningless.
In fact, if she recovered really quickly at the first vet check, I would
probably be a bit concerned that she was more tired than she ought to be
at the first vet check.

I am glad that the vets here are allowed to use their discretion rather
than being overly concerned about what, for a "normal" horse, would indeed
be concerning.

And even for a "normal" horse, a high heart rate pre-ride (with no other
signs to indicate a pathology) would be pretty meaningless.

kat
Orange County, Calif.



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