Horse On Box Rest? How Can Equine Massage Help?
Is your horse on box rest?
How can Equine Massage help?
It's widely known now that the box rest is not ideal for your horse, both physically and mentally, however it can be a necessary evil.
Should your horse become sick or injured there may be time when confinement for either a short or extended period of time is the only option available in order to give your horse to the very best chance of recovery.
Horses by nature are designed to move pretty much constantly throughout the day and night and many of the systems in their body require movement in order to function correctly.
This includes the lymphatic system and digestive system, but also the circulatory system and peripheral nervous system.
Equine Massage is a broad term used to cover many different manual therapies and with knowledge and experience can be adapted and specifically tailored to each individual horse’s needs.
Equine Massage Therapy is also a highly effective therapy that through tactile stimulation can help to reduce the chances of some of the unfortunate ‘side effects’ of box rest such as colic in the static horse, muscle wastage, oedema, reduced proprioception and reduced circulation.
Using Equine Massage can also help to increase the speed of any healing process and can reduce the incidence of scarring.
It is also a great way to stimulate your horse mentally whilst they won’t be getting the movement and tactile stimulation from other horses that they would usually have in their day to day lives. Regular sessions will also help to break up the long days which is going to mentally help a horse that is in confinement and is unable to move around and graze and do other behaviours that are natural to them.
The reason for the box rest needs to be considered before choosing which Equine Massage techniques to use on the horse.
For example, there are contraindications to some massage, such as if your horse has an infection. You would not want massage and possibly spread the infection around the body until the infection has cleared.
However, so long as the vet that is supporting your horse through this time gives their approval for Equine Massage to be performed, there are many ways in which you can work.
If you are working to reduce scar tissue for example, you could also implement other therapies such as red & infrared light therapy.
So long as your box resting horse is weight-bearing and not suffering from any acute fractures you could use weight transfer exercises, dynamic stretching, muscle activations or even EMS (Electro Muscle Stimulation) to increase muscle contraction and therefore prevent muscle wastage.
You can also increase blood flow to the static horse by using techniques, such as shaking, Cross Fibre Grooming, or the application of acupressure can also be useful to stimulate certain points on the horse’s body to help with things like pain management.
One of the foundation Massage Techniques known as Effleurage is also a great gentle way to get your hands all over the horse feel for any heat, cold, swelling or soreness.
It can be common to find tight areas of compensation which your horse may develop due to lack of movement.
Nothing can beat getting a trained and experienced pair hands all over your horse to detect anything unusual and to find out how they are feeling. This cannot be achieved by using a massage rug, gadget or tool.
From my experience, most horses prefer being treated hands-on by an experience therapist. That's not to say your box rested horse would not benefit from a PEMF rug, massage rug, even some of the pumping and lymphatic rugs that are available. These products are all extremely useful, but what they cannot do is assess your horse during the therapy like a real life pair of eyes and hands can.
Horses on box rest will benefit from much more regular than normal treatments and also during their rehab, they should checked extremely regularly.
Be sure to take regular photographs to help monitor your horse too, as seeing them on a daily basis you may not notice the slow subtle changes in their bodies, both negative or positive changes.
Careful monitoring alongside your manual therapist will really give your horse the very best chance to hopefully be able to get them out of the stable as soon as possible.
Once your horse is able to start leaving the stable, you should be able start to return to their ‘normal’ day to day life. That may be small paddock turn out, hand walking, or some other controlled movement to begin, but ultimately just something that's going to get the body moving. This should be when you will begin to make the most progress in your recovery. After all ‘Motion is Lotion’.
There are lots of other aspects to keeping your horse healthy and happy when on box rest, I just wanted to share my experience of how beneficial hands-on massage therapy can be in these situations.
Thank you for visiting my blog.
Jess