Osseous trauma—which can include subchondral bone damage, articular cartilage damage, and fracture—is either a repetitive stress injury or a one-off incidence of acute overload with excessive twisting. | Photo: Courtesy Dr. Ellen Singer

With the rise of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in equine medicine, veterinarians have picked up on a variety of lameness conditions that were harder to identify and/or evaluate in the past. One that appears to occur most frequently in sport horses such as eventers, show jumpers, and dressage horses is osseous trauma (bone damage) of the sagittal groove of the long pastern bone (proximal phalanx), which lies beneath the ridge in the bottom of the cannon bone at the base of the fetlock.

Ellen Singer, BA, DVM, DVSc, Dipl. ACVS, ECVS, MRCVS, formerly a senior lecturer in equine orthopedics at the University of Liverpool and now a private consultant, described the pathophysiology behind this finding and how to diagnose and treat it at the 2018 British Equine Veterinary Association Congress, held Sept. 12-15, in Birmingham, U.K.

What Is It?

Osseous trauma to this region can include subchondral bone (below the joint cartilage) damage, articular cartilage damage, and fracture. Singer said it’s either a repetitive stress injury or a one-off incidence of acute overload with excessive twisting