Treating Hoof Bruise on Barefoot Horse

Equine Case Study

Species: Horse
Breed: Italian saddlebred
Sex: Gelding
Age: 5 YO

Clinical case:

This barefoot horse showed acute hoof pain with 3/5 lameness on the right front limb, positive reaction to the hoof tester and increased digital pulse at rest. This clinical presentation is pretty typical for a hoof bruise or hoof abscess; this horse lives in a pasture so the treatment option needed to avoid sole incision, drainage, and hoof bandage.

Therapy:

Three MLS^® Laser Therapy treatments have been applied every other day, using the pre-set program “acute pain” with point-to-point modality (18 seconds per point) along the coronet bend, on heel bulbs, frog and sole.

After the third application, lameness had improved (2/5) and at rest, there wasn’t any digital pulse.

A week after the last treatment the gait at the trot was almost back to normality, and one month later the horse has not shown any sign of recurrence.