Y
ou or someone
you know has
probably had a
horse come up
lame for a rea-
son that’s not immedi-
ately obvious. He doesn’t
have an obvious wound
or a swelling that you
can see from across the
barn aisle, yet is limping
nonetheless. It’s perplex-
ing. Horses are a signifi-
cant investment of time,
money and emotion.
You’d really like to
know what’s wrong.
However, you most likely
also have a few questions
rolling around in your
mind:
n Assuming that you
don’t want to provide a
blank check, what should
you do?
n Even if you do write a
blank check, how likely is
it that you will come up
with an answer?
n Even if you do come
up with an answer, will
the answer make any dif-
ference in your treatment?
The standard for
lameness diagnosis and
treatment has been to try
to find out exactly what
the problem is and then
try to “fix” it. If you know
the exact cause, you can[ october 2019 | horseillustrated.com 35 ]
The question of
how far to go while
investigating a
mystery lameness
has plagued
most horse
owners at one time
or another.By david W. Ramey, dvm