Half of owners cannot identify equine lameness, research finds

Only about half of owners can recognise equine forelimb lameness, and a third hindlimb issues – and confidence in spotting issues does not necessarily match ability.

These were the findings of a study presented at the British Equine Veterinary Association Congress (11-14 September), by final-year vet student Jade England.

Ms England explained that lameness is one of the most often reported conditions in horses, and that previous research has suggested a high prevalence of undiagnosed lameness. This project, to investigate owners’ ability and confidence in identifying lameness, involved an online questionnaire completed by 509 people.

Each was shown videos of a sound horse, those with fore- and hindlimb lameness and one with bilateral shifting forelimb lameness.

Of these, 50.6% identified the sound horse, 50.3% the forelimb lameness, 32.3% the hindlimb issue and 8.9% the bilateral lameness.

“Investigating owner confidence, we found that most owners rated their confidence four out of five for identifying forelimb lameness, three out of five for hindlimb lameness, and two out of five for bilateral lameness,” Ms England said. “There is a group of people who are quite confident, but actually have the lower lameness identification scores, and a group who are lacking in confidence, but it doesn’t really correlate with their score.”

When asked about clinical signs of lameness, most selected head nods or hip hikes but far fewer cited pain expressions or behaviour changes.

“It’s probably no surprise that horse owners struggle to identify lameness, particularly hindlimb and bilateral lamenesses,” Ms England said. “Signs such as behavioural changes and pain expressions could really help with this, but we’re finding that owners are rarely using these.

“The results from this study can really help us understand the knowledge gaps and barriers owners may face when identifying lameness in their horses. We can use this to develop evidence-based resources focused on helping owners to improve recognition and understanding of lameness, leading to earlier identification, earlier diagnosis and faster access to treatment.”

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