Medication of the Navicular Bursa in Horses with Signs of Navicular Area Pain Unresponsive to Other Treatments: 25 Cases (1999-2002)

摘要

Medication of the navicular bursa may provide temporary improvement in horses with signs of chronic navicular area pain that fail to respond to other treatments.It has been estimated that navicular area pain is responsible for approximately one third of chronic forelimb lameness seen in the horse. Diagnosis of navicular pain is usually based on historical data, clinical signs, response to palmar digital nerve (PDN) anesthesia or distal interphalangeal joint (DIP) analgesia, and detection of radiographic lesions. However, presentation of some but not all of these symptoms can complicate the diagnosis; in fact, there is a recognized group of horses with clinicalsigns of navicular area pain that have no radiographic abnormalities. In addition, interpretation of the effects of PDN anesthesia versus DIP or navicular bursa analgesia have become controversial, especially with recent evidence that shows a lack of specificity of analgesia of the DIP joint.Advanced diagnostic imaging techniques such as nuclear scintigraphy, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), and computed tomography (CT) are beneficial but often unavailable.