Let’s face it: Horses weren’t designed to carry humans on their backs. Therefore, a horse’s spinal health is crucial to his function as a riding horse.

In this article, Moira Nusbaum, DVM, of PenMar Equine, in Myersville, Maryland, shares common issues owners encounter with their horses’ spine and appropriate treatments.

“The different parts of the spine serve different forms and functions,” she said during the Society of Master Saddlers Introduction to Saddle Fitting course, held May 1-2, in Hagerstown, Maryland. “To say that ‘a vertebrae is a vertebrae’ is simply not true.”

The cervical (neck), thoracic (from the withers to the last rib), and lumbar (from the last rib to the pelvis) vertebrae and their various muscle groups create a remarkable amount of spinal flexion and extension, she added

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