![]() But interstitial pressure is already very low compared to vascular (blood vessel) pressure. How much pressure is necessary? Researchers haven’t come up with a firm answer yet, says Canada. In essentially the same scientific phenomenon as we described for wrapping wounds, pressure to the legs helps even out blood pressure to keep fluid from collecting in the lower limbs. Pressure from transport wraps can help prevent stocking up in any immobile horse. So a horse that’s just standing still for long periods of time can ‘stock up’-meaning they get edema (fluid swelling) within their distal limbs.” That swelling can be painful in some horses and even predispose them to getting scratches (the skin infection also known as pastern dermatitis) because the skin becomes fragile. “Horses were meant to walk around all day, and the blood flow in their legs is dependent on them moving around. “There actually is a purpose,” Canada says. Again, we experienced horse people know that putting shipping boots or bandages on our traveling horses is just something you do.īut peer pressure isn’t the reason to wrap a trailered horse. Going on a road trip? Pull out the transport wraps. Reduce risk by always using padding (e.g., pillow pads) beneath the wrap to help distribute pressure, and keep bandage overlaps as even as possible. This, he says, is a common cause of bowed tendons. Unevenly distributed pressure-which can come from applying bandages with irregular overlap-can cause pressure peaks that can create direct trauma to the tendon or affect the blood flow to it. While pressure can be great for leg wounds, the wrong kind of pressure can be detrimental, he cautions. But any time you have a tendon injury, one of the first things you should do is give it support by applying some sort of pressure.” ![]() “So that will help with reducing swelling in tendons and ligaments, although the extent of that hasn’t been investigated. “Anything you put on the outside of the skin is going to transmit that pressure to whatever soft tissues are underneath it,” Canada says. It works so well, in fact, that the pressure even helps reduce swelling and aid healing of tendon injuries. “That will ultimately raise the pressure within that interstitial fluid-(which serves as) the communication channel between the blood vessel and the rest of the body-and make it a more equal plane.” “By putting on a pressure wrap, we’re applying pressure to the skin, and that pressure is transmitted to the deeper tissues of the body,” he says. Those cause the blood vessel barriers to become “leaky,” allowing more fluid to seep into the surrounding tissues. Essentially, injury-induced inflammation affects the proteins in the bloodstream, which then affect the cytokines (inflammatory proteins) and cellular pathways. There’s also a chemical process going on at the cellular level, Canada says. “The water’s going to go from high pressure to low pressure areas.” He likens a leg injury’s tendency to swell to how a garden hose works. ACVS, staff surgeon at Texas Equine Hospital, in Bryan. “The equine body’s response to injury in the distal (lower) limb is to swell, which can be protective in some ways (like reducing bleeding immediately after injury) but detrimental if not resolved in the later stages of wound healing,” says Nathan Canada, DVM, MS, Dipl. In fact, keeping the swelling down could be the most important part of the healing process. You might also know that wrapping a leg wound can help reduce swelling. And a wrap will help protect that wound from contamination. Sure, pressure to any wound will help stop bleeding by encouraging clotting. ![]() Whether it’s something we’ve learned from experience, from veterinary advice, or from reading about horse care, we know that using padding and bandages to wrap a leg wound is essential first aid. Bring out the bandages, because nothing says leg wound treatment like good a wrap. You don’t know how he did it but you do know what to do about it. You know the feeling-when you walk into your horse’s paddock and find the dreaded leg gash. It’s a growing field that still needs lots of “padding” and extra “layers” of research before we can fully understand it.īut in the meantime, we’ve gone to some of today’s top equine biomechanics researchers to get a better grasp on the science of the wrap and to help us unravel some of its mysteries. You might be surprised to learn there’s actually very little research about the inner workings of the equine leg when wraps and boots are applied. ![]()
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