Infrared Imaging CASE STUDY

Boo is an 18 year old warmblood who enjoys show jumping, dressage and hacking. Boo’s owner brought him in from the field one day and it looked like he had slipped right over in the mud, he was very lame.

The vet was called out a day later and the owner was given two options. Option one was to take scans of the leg to see exactly what the problem is, option two was the rest the horse for 5 weeks and the vet would re-assess the lameness and take scans.

Scanning is an expensive option, costing around £150-£250 per scan. The owner left the vet with the first option, to box rest and come back in 5 weeks. This is when I received a message to come out to scan the legs to identify where the issue was located.

Thermal imaging is tool above veterinary scans in the sense that you can find the exact effected area and the amount of heat and inflammation surrounding the area, you can note other areas that are being effected for example the hock, knee or hoof (if inflammation is spreading) and then keep a monitor of how the healing process is doing, if there are ways of speeding the healing process and to ensure the horse is 110% healed through precise heat and inflammation detections.

MRI scans and XRAYs are usually repeated after a recovery programme even if the horse looks sound. MRI and XRAYS do not tell you the temperature is back to the same pattern as the other legs and and if all inflammation has disappeared. Thermal imaging allows you to identify the exact process and even when the horse shows up as sound, you can ensure more than a full recovery. Many horses do not recover 100% after injuries when returning to work which can sometimes leave the animal with unnecessary scarring and superficial damages to the legs.

This image below was taken just a few days after the injury had taken place; the horse had been on box rest and was not seriously lame. The horse was not fed any anti-inflammatories.

After careful set up and software analysis we were able to quickly identify the problem area. The Deep Digital Tendon area located the issue causing swelling down the leg and into the hoof.

The advice given to the owner followed the vets. Box rest and ice the leg twice daily. A scan would be repeated after two weeks to see the improvement (if any).

The image below shows the scan after just two weeks, the horse is almost entirely sound and the swelling has gone down. Looking from the human eye you would continue this horses ridden routine however the infrared image shows me there is still a 1 degree difference between the two front legs. One degree is significant to the horse. The slight increase of inflammation on the right leg has been caused through pain compensated from the left forelimb.

This means the advice given to the owner continues the rest and icing for now until another scan was performed a week later to ensure the horse had fully recovered.

Infrared imaging ensures the horse’s full recovery even after the injury has healed. This means the site of injury has the smallest chance possible of re-injuring.