Disease treatment in horses encompasses a range of medical interventions and management strategies aimed at addressing various health conditions affecting equine species. These treatments can include pharmacological approaches, such as the administration of antibiotics, anti-inflammatory drugs, and antiparasitic medications, as well as non-pharmacological methods like physical therapy, dietary adjustments, and surgical procedures. The selection of appropriate treatments depends on the specific disease, its severity, and the individual needs of the horse. This topic brings together peer-reviewed research studies and scholarly articles that explore the efficacy, safety, and advancements in therapeutic options for equine diseases, providing insights into best practices and emerging trends in equine veterinary medicine.
Wang Z, Zeng S, Wang Y, Wang T, Qu H, Zhu Y, Li J.Reproductive disorders in donkeys present a significant challenge to their health and welfare, impacting their roles in agriculture, conservation, and companionship. With the development of large-scale donkey farming in recent years, reproductive disorders have become a limiting factor for the expansion of the donkey population. In general, donkeys suffer from a similar array of diseases like horses, but little is known about the specificities of donkey reproductive disorders. This review synthesizes current knowledge on the pathogenesis, distribution, presentation, diagnosis, treatment, and p...
Wang X, Shi M, Cao C, Zeng R, Yao Y.Lactobacillus casei Zhang (Lac.z), isolated from traditional sour horse milk in Inner Mongolia, can alleviate various diseases and promote health. Our previous studies found that pretreatment with live Lac.z (L-Lac.z) could significantly attenuate acute kidney injury and delay the progression of chronic renal fibrosis. However, it is unknown whether these effects could be maintained by pasteurized Lac.z (P-Lac.z). Mouse models of acute kidney injury and chronic renal fibrosis induced by renal bilateral ischemia-reperfusion (BIR) surgery were treated with L-Lac.z or P-Lac.z by gavage. Serum and...
Heidari N, Faragher RGA, Pattison G, Dudhia J, Smith RKW.Tendinopathy is a common age-related disease which causes significant morbidity for both human athletes and performance horses. In the latter, the superficial digital flexor tendon is an excellent model for human tendinopathies because it is a functional homologue of the human Achilles tendon and a primary site of injuries with strong similarities to the human disease. Corticosteroids have been previously used clinically to treat tendinopathic inflammation, but they upregulate the p53-p21 axis with concomitant reductions in cell proliferation and collagen synthesis in human tenocytes. This phe...
Carmona JU, Carmona-Ramírez LH, López C.(1) Background: There is increasing interest in the use of platelet-rich plasma and related orthobiologics for the treatment of chronic musculoskeletal disorders in horses; however, there is no information on the bibliometric impact of the literature published in this area. (2) Methods: A bibliometric analysis was performed using the bibliometrix R package by analyzing the documents registered in the WOS and Scopus databases from 2000 to 2024. The included registers were evaluated according to the menu of results from the biblioshiny web app (overview, sources, authors, documents, words, trend...
Hollis AR.Squamous cell carcinomas are a very common tumor type in horses, and are found in a variety of dermatologic and non-dermatologic locations. Metastasis is common, even at the first presentation of the disease, and a full staging workup is therefore strongly recommended to direct treatment and assist with prognostication. Wide surgical excision remains the treatment of choice in most cases, but recurrence is common, and adjunctive therapy may be indicated to improve the long-term prognosis.
Symoens A, Westerfeld R, Vives BM, André V, Moulon L, Collomb M, Richard H, Juette T, Bédard C, Leclère M.Steaming hay significantly reduces respirable particles and provides a palatable alternative to dry hay for horses with asthma, but there are few prospective studies demonstrating the clinical efficacy of steamed hay. Objective: To compare the efficacy of alfalfa pellets and steamed hay in improving lung function and inflammation of horses with severe asthma (SEA). Methods: Controlled crossover study. Methods: Ten horses with SEA were enrolled and nine completed the study. Horses were housed indoors and fed hay. Once in exacerbation, they were fed pellets and steamed hay for 4 weeks, in a cr...
Di Salvo A, Chiaradia E, Sforna M, Della Rocca G.Since the discovery of the endocannabinoid system and due to the empirical evidence of the therapeutic effects on several illnesses both in humans and animals that follow the administration of exogenous cannabinoids (i.e., phytocannabinoids), numerous studies have been conducted. These investigations aimed to identify the expression and distribution of cannabinoid receptors in healthy and pathologic organs and tissues of different animal species and to define the interactions of phytocannabinoids with these receptors. In the last decade, pharmacokinetics, efficacy and tolerability of many Cann...
Jia Q, Ren H, Zhang S, Yang H, Gao S, Fan R.All subtypes of () produce the alpha toxin (CPA), which can cause enteritis or enterotoxemia in lambs, cattle, pigs, and horses, as well as traumatic clostridial myonecrosis in humans and animals. CPA acts on cell membranes, ultimately leading to endocytosis and cell death. Therefore, the neutralization of CPA is crucial for the prevention and treatment of diseases caused by . In this study, utilizing CPA as an antigen, a nanobody (CPA-VHH) with a half-life of 2.9 h, an affinity constant (KD) of 0.9 nmol/L, and good stability below 60 °C was prepared from a natural nanobody library from alpa...
Malalana F.Chemotherapy is the treatment of cancerous cells through the use of cytotoxic drugs. Whilst the use of systemic (intravenous) chemotherapy in equine practice is generally limited to the management of lymphoma, cytotoxic drugs are commonly used in the treatment of accessible skin tumors, either by topical application in the form of ointments or injected intralesionally. These drugs should be employed with caution due to the risk of serious adverse effects. In addition, extreme caution should be followed when preparing, handling, administering, and disposing them, due to their carcinogenic, muta...
Mendoza FJ, Pérez-Écija A, Kappmeyer LS, Suarez CE, Bastos RG.Equine piroplasmosis (EP) is a global tick-borne disease of equids caused by the intraerythrocytic apicomplexan parasites and , and the more recently discovered . These parasites can be transmitted by several tick species, including , , and , but iatrogenic and vertical transmission are also common. Clinical signs of EP include poor performance, fever, icterus, abortions, among others, and peracute or acute forms of infection are associated with high mortality in non-endemic areas. EP is a reportable disease and represents an important barrier for the international trade of horses and other e...
Stevanović J, Glavinić U, Ristanić M, Erjavec V, Denk B, Dolašević S, Stanimirović Z.This review aims to present current knowledge on the effects of honey bee products on animals based on in vivo studies, focusing on their application in clinical veterinary practice. Honey's best-proven effectiveness is in treating wounds, including those infected with antibiotic-resistant microorganisms, as evidenced in horses, cats, dogs, mice, and rats. Propolis manifested a healing effect in numerous inflammatory and painful conditions in mice, rats, dogs, and pigs and also helped in oncological cases in mice and rats. Bee venom is best known for its effectiveness in treating neuropathy an...
Tan Yi Shean L, Milne EM, Shaw DJ, Maxwell S, Del-Pozo J.Lipofuscin is a complex mixture of highly oxidized, cross-linked macromolecules that accumulates in neurons with age and some neurodegenerative diseases. Equine dysautonomia (ED) is a polyneuropathy that mainly affects autonomic and enteric nervous systems, resulting in alimentary tract dysfunction. Our main aim was to determine whether neuronal lipofuscin increased with increasing duration of ED. We investigated the prevalence of lipofuscin in cranial cervical ganglia of horses with acute (AED), subacute (SED), and chronic ED (CED), young controls (of similar age to ED cases), and aged contro...
Kabir A, Lamichhane B, Habib T, Adams A, El-Sheikh Ali H, Slovis NM, Troedsson MHT, Helmy YA.The equine industry holds substantial economic importance not only in the USA but worldwide. The occurrence of various infectious bacterial diseases in horses can lead to severe health issues, economic losses, and restrictions on horse movement and trade. Effective management and control of these diseases are therefore crucial for the growth and sustainability of the equine industry. While antibiotics constitute the primary treatment strategy for any bacterial infections in horses, developing resistance to clinically important antibiotics poses significant challenges to equine health and welfa...
Hallowell KL, Hepworth-Warren KL, Dembek K.Available descriptive studies on equine pneumonia are outdated or focus on specific horse or bacterial populations. Objective: To describe the clinical presentation and bacterial isolates of adult horses with bacterial pneumonia and identify factors associated with death. Methods: One hundred sixteen horses >2 years old with bacterial pneumonia. Methods: Retrospective case series. Data regarding history, physical examination, clinicopathologic features, treatment, bacterial culture and sensitivity, and outcome were collected and analyzed retrospectively. Results: Historical risk factors w...
Long AE, Pitta D, Hennessy M, Indugu N, Vecchiarelli B, Luethy D, Aceto H, Hurcombe S.Currently, lack of standardization for fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) in equine practice has resulted in highly variable techniques, and there is no data on the bacterial metabolic activity or viability of the administered product. The objectives of this study were to compare the total and potentially metabolically active bacterial populations in equine FMT, and assess the effect of different frozen storage times, buffers, and temperatures on an equine FMT product. Fresh feces collected from three healthy adult horses was subjected to different storage methods. This included different ...
Del Prete C, Montano C, Cocchia N, de Chiara M, Gasparrini B, Pasolini MP.Defining the optimal therapy for endometritis remains a significant challenge for clinicians. Given the public health threat posed by antibiotic resistance and the inconclusiveness of traditional therapies, regenerative medicine has been proposed as an alternative. The objective of this study was to conduct a comprehensive systematic review and meta-analysis, to investigate the efficacy of regenerative medicine products in the treatment of both post-breeding persistent and chronic degenerative endometritis (PBIE/CDE) in mares, following the PRISMA guidelines. This research could be a comprehen...
Bell J, Raidal SL, Hughes KJ.Changes to the faecal microbiota of horses associated with administration of anthelmintic drugs is poorly defined. This study included horses with cyathostomin infection where susceptibility and resistance to oxfendazole and abamectin was known. This study assessed the changes to the faecal microbiota associated with administration of two different anthelmintics in this population. Twenty-four adult horses were included. Faecal egg counts were performed on all horses prior to random allocation into abamectin (n=8), oxfendazole (n=8) or Control groups (n=8) and at Day 14 post treatment. Faecal ...
Toner S, Leguillette R, Israel J, Legge C, Samani ARE, Kavanagh M, Goodmanson M.A 21-year-old retired polo Argentinian thoroughbred horse from a teaching herd was presented for a routine bronchoalveolar lavage demonstration, during which an incidental finding of a granulomatous mass on the dorsal aspect of the epiglottis was made. Rhinosporidium seeberi was suspected from a histological section obtained from an initial biopsy, and the mass was removed via laser surgery for cytology and PCR. Sequencing of the PCR amplicons confirmed the diagnosis of R. seeberi. A treatment protocol of nebulized voriconazole for 10 d postoperatively was used. Long-term follow-up required 2 ...
Muñoz-Prieto A, Llamas-Amor E, Cerón JJ, Hansen S.Equine gastric ulcer syndrome (EGUS) is a prevalent condition in horses, affecting up to 93% of racehorses. Comprising the equine squamous gastric disease (ESGD) and the equine glandular gastric disease (EGGD), EGUS poses significant health challenges. Saliva, a non-invasive and easily obtainable sample, is increasingly recognized for its potential as a source of biomarkers in horses. This study investigates changes in saliva analytes using automated assays before and after EGUS treatment, aiming to identify biomarkers indicative of treatment success or failure. A total of 28 horses diagnosed ...
Pimenta J, Prada J, Pires I, Cotovio M.Sarcoids and squamous cell carcinomas (SCCs) are the most concerning equine oncological diseases. Both tumors are challenging to manage due to their invasive behavior and high prevalence of recurrences. Furthermore, SCCs have a propensity to metastasize. Programed cell-death ligand 1 (PD-L1) has been one of the main therapeutic targets for immunotherapy in various human tumors. PD-L1 research in equine tumors is scarce and more efforts are necessary to understand the potential of this biomarker as a therapeutical target. Unassigned: Evaluate the immunohistochemical expression of PD-L1 in equin...
Dupont J, Roman Dura B, Salciccia A, Serteyn D, Sandersen C.To study the changes in dynamic compliance (C), ventilation/perfusion (V˙/ Q˙) mismatch and haemodynamic variables in hypoxaemic anaesthetized horses whose PaO increased following salbutamol inhalation. Methods: Retrospective, clinical, cohort study. Methods: A group of 73 client-owned horses treated with salbutamol when PaO <100 mmHg (13.3 kPa) during anaesthesia. Methods: Horses were divided into two groups: responders (R), where PaO after salbutamol ≥1.2 PaO before treatment (i.e. ≥20% increase), and non-responders (NR), where PaO after salbutamol <1.2 PaO before treatment. Demographi...
Guenther MC, Borowicz PP, Hirchert MR, Semanchik PL, Simons JL, Fridley J, White-Springer SH, Hammer CJ.The neonatal Fc receptor (FcRn) is the receptor responsible for bidirectional transport of immunoglobulin G (IgG) across cells, maintenance of IgG levels in serum, and assisting with antigen presentation. Unfortunately, little is known about FcRn in horses. Therefore, the objective of this study was to provide fundamental information regarding the location of FcRn in equine tissues. Tissues were collected from six horses of mixed breed, age, and sex immediately following euthanasia. Sampling locations included the respiratory tract, gastrointestinal tract (GIT), other visceral organs, cornea, ...
Schumacher A, Gehlen H.This literature review analyzes the historical development of polo, its organizational structure, the course of the game, as well as the breeding, rearing, and training practices of polo horses. Frequently occurring ailments, such as musculoskeletal injuries, respiratory diseases, and internal illnesses, are highlighted. Lameness is a major problem, with injuries to the superficial digital flexor tendon being the most common cause. Other notable diseases include exercise-induced pulmonary hemorrhage (EIPH), myositis, rhabdomyolysis, and equine infectious anemia (EIA). To ensure the welfare of ...
Baraille M, Buttet M, Grimm P, Milojevic V, Julliand S, Julliand V.Horse owners and veterinarians report that from the age of 15, their horses can lose body condition and be more susceptible to diseases. Large intestinal microbiome changes may be involved. Indeed, microbiota is crucial for maintaining the condition and health of herbivores by converting fibres into nutrients. This study aimed to compare the faecal microbiome in horses aged from 6 to 30 years old (yo), living in the same environment and consuming the same diet, in order to assess whether the parameters changed linearly with age and whether there was a pivotal age category. Fifty horses were se...
Pereira R, Bowen M, Rapezzano G, Redpath A, Pratt S, Hallowell G.Recombinant intracameral tissue plasminogen activator (rTPA) administration can aid clearance of fibrin from the anterior chamber. In this retrospective multicentre case series, the effect of intracameral rTPA administration to treat fibrin in the anterior chamber resulting from trauma or inflammatory ocular disease was evaluated. Clinical data from 30 treatments in 29 horses were obtained from medical records from 2003 to 2022. Association between time from onset of clinical signs and time for rTPA treatment to effect was studied with regression analysis. Twenty-seven horses (93.1%) had no pr...
Brodesser DM, Kummer S, Eichberger JA, Schlangen K, Corteggio A, Borzacchiello G, Bertram CA, Brandt S, Pratscher B.The ability of human melanoma cells to switch from an epithelial to a mesenchymal phenotype contributes to the metastatic potential of disease. Metalloproteinases (MPs) are crucially involved in this process by promoting the detachment of tumor cells from the primary lesion and their migration to the vasculature. In gray horse melanoma, epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) is poorly understood, prompting us to address MP expression in lesions versus intact skin by transcriptome analyses and the immunofluorescence staining (IF) of gray horse tumor tissue and primary melanoma cells. RNAseq re...
Marsella R.Autoimmune dermatopathies are not common in horses. These autoimmune diseases can be idiopathic or triggered by an antigen such as drugs, vaccines, or neoplasia. The most common one is pemphigus foliaceus, which manifests as a pustular, crusting eruption. Other more common pustular diseases should be ruled out before considering pemphigus. Vasculitis is relatively common in horses and can be triggered by a variety of antigenic stimulations. Systemic lupus and true idiopathic autoimmune vasculitis are very rare in horses. Every effort should be made to reach a final diagnosis, as the prognosis ...
Machado M, Camacho AL, Coubrough C, R R Queiroz-Machado C, Custodio C, Barros CSL, Riet-Correa F, Menchaca A.We reported thirteen cases of bilateral stringhalt associated with Hypochaeris radicata that occurred in horses in Uruguay during a severe drought in the summer of 2023. All horses were affected chronically and progressively by bilateral hyperflexion of hindlimbs. In two severely affected horses, the main histological lesions included neuronal chromatolysis and axonal spheroids in the ventral gray horn in the lumbar and sacral spinal cord and axonal degeneration and digestion chambers in ventral roots fibers and long peripheral nerves. We suggest that in addition to injuries to peripheral nerv...
Watts AE, Yeager AE, Kopyov OV, Nixon AJ.Tendon injury is a common problem in athletes, with poor tissue regeneration and a high rate of re-injury. Stem cell therapy is an attractive treatment modality as it may induce tissue regeneration rather than tissue repair. Currently, there are no reports on the use of pluripotent cells in a large animal tendon model in vivo. We report the use of intra-lesional injection of male, fetal derived embryonic-like stem cells (fdESC) that express Oct-4, Nanog, SSEA4, Tra 1-60, Tra 1-81 and telomerase. Methods: Tendon injury was induced using a collagenase gel-physical defect model in the mid-metacar...
Seino KK, Long MT, Gibbs EP, Bowen RA, Beachboard SE, Humphrey PP, Dixon MA, Bourgeois MA.We used a severe challenge model that produces clinical West Nile virus (WNV) disease to test the efficacy of three commercially available equine WNV vaccines in horses. Twenty-four healthy, WNV-seronegative horses of varying ages and genders were placed, in random and blind manner, into three trial groups consisting of eight horses each; two horses in each group received (i) an inactivated WNV vaccine (K-WN), (ii) a modified-live vaccine (CP-WN) containing the WNV prM and E proteins expressed by a canarypox vector, (iii) a live-chimera vaccine (WN-FV) containing WNV prM and E proteins express...
Berglund AK, Schnabel LV.Allogeneic mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) are a promising cell source for treating musculoskeletal injuries in horses. Controversy exists, however, over whether major histocompatibility complex (MHC)-mismatched MSCs are recognised by the recipient immune system and targeted for death by a cytotoxic antibody response. Objective: To determine if cytotoxic anti-MHC antibodies generated in vivo following MHC-mismatched MSC injections are capable of initiating complement-dependent cytotoxicity of MSCs. Methods: Experimental controlled study. Methods: Antisera previously collected at Days 0, 7, 14 an...
Richardson LE, Dudhia J, Clegg PD, Smith R.Stem cells have evoked considerable excitement in the animal-owning public because of the promise that stem cell technology could deliver tissue regeneration for injuries for which natural repair mechanisms do not deliver functional recovery and for which current therapeutic strategies have minimal effectiveness. This review focuses on the current use of stem cells within veterinary medicine, whose practitioners have used mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs), recovered from either bone marrow or adipose tissue, in clinical cases primarily to treat strain-induced tendon injury in the horse. The backgr...
Leclere M, Lavoie-Lamoureux A, Joubert P, Relave F, Setlakwe EL, Beauchamp G, Couture C, Martin JG, Lavoie JP.Recent studies suggest that airway smooth muscle remodeling is an early event in the course of asthma. Little is known of the effects of long-term antigen avoidance and inhaled corticosteroids on chronically established airway remodeling. We sought to measure the effects of inhaled corticosteroids and antigen avoidance on airway remodeling in the peripheral airways of horses with heaves, a naturally occurring asthma-like disease. Heaves-affected adult horses with ongoing airway inflammation and bronchoconstriction were treated with fluticasone propionate (with and without concurrent antigen av...
Rico-Hesse R, Weaver SC, de Siger J, Medina G, Salas RA.One of the most important questions in arbovirology concerns the origin of epidemic Venezuelan equine encephalitis (VEE) viruses; these viruses caused periodic, extensive epidemics/epizootics in the Americas from 1938-1973 (reaching the United States in 1971) but had recently been presumed extinct. We have documented the 1992 emergence of a new epidemic/epizootic VEE virus in Venezuela. Phylogenetic analysis of strains isolated during two outbreaks indicated that the new epidemic/epizootic virus(es) evolved recently from an enzootic VEE virus in northern South America. These results suggest co...
Hidaka C, Goodrich LR, Chen CT, Warren RF, Crystal RG, Nixon AJ.Cartilage has a limited capacity to heal. Although chondrocyte transplantation is a useful therapeutic strategy, the repair process can be lengthy. Previously we have shown that over expression of bone morphogenetic protein-7 (BMP-7) in chondrocytes by adenovirus-mediated gene transfer leads to increased matrix synthesis and cartilage-like tissue formation in vitro. In this context we hypothesized that implantation of genetically modified chondrocytes expressing BMP-7 would accelerate the formation of hyaline-like repair tissue in an equine model of cartilage defect repair. Methods: Chondrocyt...
Giguère S, Prescott JF.Since the 1986 Rhodococcus equi workshop, there have been major breakthroughs in understanding the epidemiology of, the virulence of, and the immune response to, this intriguing pathogen. However, with the exception of the use of hyperimmune plasma for the prevention of the disease (Martens et al., 1989; Madigan et al., 1991) the clinical aspects of R. equi infections have essentially remained unchanged. This article reviews the various clinical manifestations and summarizes recent advances in diagnosis, treatment and prevention of R. equi infections in foals.
Nielsen MK, Baptiste KE, Tolliver SC, Collins SS, Lyons ET.Increasing levels of anthelmintic resistance in equine nematodes have led to recommendations of more sustainable anthelmintic treatment protocols with emphasis on parasite surveillance and diagnosis, rather than prophylactic calendar-based treatments. This requires knowledge of the diagnostic test performance of techniques for counts of eggs per gram of feces (EPG) as well as methods for culturing, counting and identifying third stage (L(3)) strongyle larvae per gram of feces (LPG). For horses, such information does not exist in the published literature. The aim of this study was to examine th...
Brault AC, Powers AM, Chavez CL, Lopez RN, Cachón MF, Gutierrez LF, Kang W, Tesh RB, Shope RE, Weaver SC.Eastern equine encephalitis virus (EEEV), the sole species in the EEE antigenic complex, is divided into North and South American antigenic varieties based on hemagglutination inhibition tests. Here we describe serologic and phylogenetic analyses of representatives of these varieties, spanning the entire temporal and geographic range available. Nucleotide sequencing and phylogenetic analyses revealed additional genetic diversity within the South American variety; 3 major South/Central American lineages were identified including one represented by a single isolate from eastern Brazil, and 2 lin...
Dalla Costa E, Stucke D, Dai F, Minero M, Leach MC, Lebelt D.Acute laminitis is a common equine disease characterized by intense foot pain, both acutely and chronically. The Obel grading system is the most widely accepted method for describing the severity of laminitis by equine practitioners, however this method requires movement (walk and trot) of the horse, causing further intense pain. The recently developed Horse Grimace Scale (HGS), a facial-expression-based pain coding system, may offer a more effective means of assessing the pain associated with acute laminitis. The aims of this study were: to investigate whether HGS can be usefully applied to a...
Bonnett BN, Egenvall A.From 1995 to the present Agria Animal Insurance, Sweden (Agria Djurförsäkring, Stockholm, Sweden) has provided data on both health care and life insurance claims for descriptive and analytical research. From these data we have published extensively on insured dogs and horses and have recently submitted a study on cat mortality. Over the periods studied most extensively (1995-2002 for dogs, 1997-2004 for horses and 1999-2006 for cats), Agria has insured approximately 200,000 dogs, 100,000 horses and up to 200,000 cats per year. Estimates based on formal research or market surveys suggest that...
El Garch H, Minke JM, Rehder J, Richard S, Edlund Toulemonde C, Dinic S, Andreoni C, Audonnet JC, Nordgren R, Juillard V.Successful vaccination against West Nile virus (WNV) requires induction of both neutralizing antibodies and cell-mediated immune responses. In this study, we have assessed the ability of a recombinant ALVAC-WNV vaccine (RECOMBITEK WNV) to elicit neutralizing antibodies and virus-specific cell-mediated immune responses in horses. In addition, we examined whether prior exposure to ALVAC-WNV vaccine would inhibit B and cell-mediated immune responses against the transgene product upon subsequent booster immunizations with the same vaccine. The results demonstrated that the recombinant ALVAC-WNV va...
Brooks SA, Gabreski N, Miller D, Brisbin A, Brown HE, Streeter C, Mezey J, Cook D, Antczak DF.Lavender Foal Syndrome (LFS) is a lethal inherited disease of horses with a suspected autosomal recessive mode of inheritance. LFS has been primarily diagnosed in a subgroup of the Arabian breed, the Egyptian Arabian horse. The condition is characterized by multiple neurological abnormalities and a dilute coat color. Candidate genes based on comparative phenotypes in mice and humans include the ras-associated protein RAB27a (RAB27A) and myosin Va (MYO5A). Here we report mapping of the locus responsible for LFS using a small set of 36 horses segregating for LFS. These horses were genotyped usin...
Dakin SG, Dudhia J, Smith RK.Injuries to the superficial digital flexor tendon (SDFT) are an important cause of morbidity and mortality in equine athletes, but the healing response is poorly understood. One important drive for the healing of connective tissues is the inflammatory cascade, but the role of inflammation in tendinopathy has been contentious in the literature. This article reviews the processes involved in the healing of tendon injuries in natural disease and experimental models. The importance of inflammatory processes known to be active in tendon disease is discussed with particular focus on recent findings ...
Koch TG, Berg LC, Betts DH.This paper provides a bird's-eye perspective of the general principles of stem-cell therapy and tissue engineering; it relates comparative knowledge in this area to the current and future status of equine regenerative medicine.The understanding of equine stem cell biology, biofactors, and scaffolds, and their potential therapeutic use in horses are rudimentary at present. Mesenchymal stem cell isolation has been proclaimed from several equine tissues in the past few years. Based on the criteria of the International Society for Cellular Therapy, most of these cells are more correctly referred t...
Bian J, Khaychuk V, Angers RC, Fernández-Borges N, Vidal E, Meyerett-Reid C, Kim S, Calvi CL, Bartz JC, Hoover EA, Agrimi U, Richt JA, Castilla J....Adaptation of prions to new species is thought to reflect the capacity of the host-encoded cellular form of the prion protein (PrP) to selectively propagate optimized prion conformations from larger ensembles generated in the species of origin. Here we describe an alternate replicative process, termed nonadaptive prion amplification (NAPA), in which dominant conformers bypass this requirement during particular interspecies transmissions. To model susceptibility of horses to prions, we produced transgenic (Tg) mice expressing cognate PrP Although disease transmission to only a subset of infecte...
Dubey JP, Lindsay DS, Saville WJ, Reed SM, Granstrom DE, Speer CA.Equine protozoal myeloencephalitis (EPM) is a serious neurological disease of horses in the Americas. The protozoan most commonly associated with EPM is Sarcocystis neurona. The complete life cycle of S. neurona is unknown, including its natural intermediate host that harbors its sarcocyst. Opossums (Didelphis virginiana, Didelphis albiventris) are its definitive hosts. Horses are considered its aberrant hosts because only schizonts and merozoites (no sarcocysts) are found in horses. EPM-like disease occurs in a variety of mammals including cats, mink, raccoons, skunks, Pacific harbor seals, p...
Batson EL, Paramour RJ, Smith TJ, Birch HL, Patterson-Kane JC, Goodship AE.Injury to the superficial digital flexor tendon (SDFT) is common in competition horses. The SDFT contributes to locomotory efficiency by storing energy; such tendons have low safety margins. Tendons which merely position the limb, including the opposing common digital extensor tendon (CDET), are rarely injured. The current failure of strategies to prevent or effectively treat injury to the SDFT indicates the importance of understanding how it differs from tendons which are not injury-prone. Objective: That the structural and material properties and matrix composition of the SDFT and CDET diffe...
Lange-Consiglio A, Corradetti B, Bizzaro D, Magatti M, Ressel L, Tassan S, Parolini O, Cremonesi F.The aim of this work was to isolate, for the first time, progenitor-like cells from the epithelial (AECs) and mesenchymal (AMCs) portions of the horse amniotic membrane, and to define the biological properties of these cells. AECs displayed polygonal epithelial morphology, while AMCs were fibroblast-like. Usually, six to eight passages were reached before proliferation decreased, with 13.08 and 26.5 cell population doublings attained after 31 days for AECs and AMCs, respectively. Immunocytochemical studies performed at passage 3 (P3) showed that both cell populations were positive for the expr...
Williams IF, McCullagh KG, Silver IA.During tissue response to injury the glycoproteins fibronectin and Type III collagen are synthesized in increased amounts. We have studied the distribution of these molecules in the healing tendon at various times after injury by comparison with that of the major constituent of normal tendon, Type I collagen. Immunofluorescent localization demonstrated the presence of fibronectin throughout the tendon within one week after injury. Staining was found in the matrix, both around capillaries and around fibroblast-like cells. Fibronectin was still apparent in the healing tendon at one month after i...
Schaffartzik A, Hamza E, Janda J, Crameri R, Marti E, Rhyner C.Insect bite hypersensitivity (IBH) is an allergic dermatitis of the horse caused by bites of insects of the genus Culicoides and is currently the best characterized allergic disease of horses. This article reviews knowledge of the immunopathogenesis of IBH, with a particular focus on the causative allergens. Whereas so far hardly any research has been done on the role of antigen presenting cells in the pathogenesis of IBH, recent studies suggest that IBH is characterized by an imbalance between a T helper 2 (Th2) and regulatory T cell (T(reg)) immune response, as shown both locally in the skin...
H A Morris L, M McCue P, Aurich C.Endometritis in the mare begins as a normal physiological inflammatory response to breeding that involves both a mechanical and immunological response pathway activated to rid the uterus of semen and bacteria. With successful resolution of this inflammation, the mare's uterus will provide a hospitable environment for the development of the semi-allogenic conceptus. If the mare fails to resolve this inflammatory response within 48 h of breeding, she will become susceptible to persistent breeding-induced endometritis (PBIE) which will have detrimental effects on her fertility. This condition can...
Romero A, Barrachina L, Ranera B, Remacha AR, Moreno B, de Blas I, Sanz A, Vázquez FJ, Vitoria A, Junquera C, Zaragoza P, Rodellar C.Several therapies have been investigated for equine tendinopathies, but satisfactory long term results have not been achieved consistently and a better understanding of the healing mechanism elicited by regenerative therapies is needed. The aim of this study was to assess the separate effects of autologous bone marrow (BM) and adipose tissue (AT) derived mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs), and platelet rich plasma (PRP), for treating lesions induced in the superficial digital flexor tendon (SDFT) of horses. Lesions were created surgically in both SDFTs of the forelimbs of 12 horses and were treated...
Hinchcliff KW, Couetil LL, Knight PK, Morley PS, Robinson NE, Sweeney CR, van Erck E.Published studies of exercise-induced pulmonary hemorrhage (EIPH), when assessed individually, often provide equivocal or conflicting results. Systematic reviews aggregate evidence from individual studies to provide a global assessment of the quality of evidence and to inform recommendations. Objective: Evaluate evidence to determine: if EIPH adversely affects the health, welfare or both of horses; if EIPH affects the athletic capacity of horses; the efficacy of prophylactic interventions for EIPH; and if furosemide affects the athletic capacity of horses. Methods: None. Methods: Systematic re...
