Advancements in technology and their growing use aim to reduce injuries in Thoroughbred racehorses

A cluster of equine deaths at California’s Santa Anita racetrack prompted the passage of the Federal Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act in 2020. The act’s intention was to reset industry standards for track safety and equine care.

Racehorse Fatalities Prompt Industry Reforms

The act established the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority (HISA), the entity charged with drafting and enforcing uniform safety and integrity rules in Thoroughbred racing. The Federal Trade Commission reviews and approves any regulations and rules proposed by HISA concerning medication administration, racetrack maintenance and safety, and premeet equine checks with a goal of reducing racehorse deaths on the track and ensuring racing community accountability.

While HISA provided a framework, these efforts built upon years of global discussions about racehorse fatalities and the need for improved track protocols and equine welfare, as noted by equine surgeon Ryan Carpenter, DVM, MS, Dipl. ACVS (LA), independent racing industry veterinarian, and Chris Kawcak, DVM, PhD, Dipl. ACVS, ACVSMR, professor of orthopedics at Colorado State University, in Fort Collins.

“The industry has been working on this problem of injured horses for decades,” says Carpenter, who is based in Cypress, California. “We identified areas to address and made improvements, and we significantly improved year after year.”

Kawcak suggests HISA’s establishment had a transformative impact on horses, jockeys, trainers, vets, and the industry’s safety and welfare approach. “Bringing HISA on board was highly contentious, but it’s been effective and thoughtful regarding injury prevention,” he says. “HISA has prioritized injury prevention, decreased fatalities, and held people accountable. It has also helped the industry be more thoughtful about racing conditions and the factors we know can be associated with injury. For instance, this year, there’s been a lot more cancellations of racing days based on weather. That’s good. The horses are being looked at closer. The medical records are being better organized.”

AAEP Guides Efforts to Improve Racehorse Welfare

Concurrent with the implementation of HISA, the American Association of Equine Practitioners (AAEP) put together a Forum on Thoroughbred Safety and Injury Prevention. It invited 25 prominent private, racetrack, and regulatory practitioners, equine surgeons, and diagnostic imaging specialists to come together, review national and international trends and available technologies, and draft key recommendations to address racetrack safety, veterinary protocols, and progress and availability of advanced imaging.

Recommendations included screening methods to identify horses at increased risk of injury pre- and postentry based on training and medical records by regulatory and private veterinarians; improved access to higher-level diagnostic technology, including regional positron-emission tomography (PET) scans; and sustainable funding options. However, Sara Langsam, VMD, chair of AAEP’s Racing Committee, says the most significant recommendation involved a request for proposals to study wearable biometric technology focusing on musculoskeletal injuries.

“We initially had 12 responses to the RFP. We scaled the 12 down to six and asked for full proposals. I could fundraise enough to cover the budgets of all six sensor companies, so we commissioned all six to recruit 2-year-olds not in training. We officially started in January