Skin And Hair (Integument) System And Diseases In Horses
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Topics
*An Introduction To The Horse Skin And Hair (Integument) System And Diseases
The purposes of skin and hair are many and equally important. They keep everything inside in and everything outside out. It grows hair and adds fat to keep us warm and it sweats to keep us cool. It senses movement and helps to feel the blades of grass that are succulent. It shakes off flies and screams for attention when it is damaged. It remains flexible around joints but firm over muscles and the face.
Abnormal Skin Features
This topic covers anything that isn’t considered normal on the skin of the horse and is not categorized into another topic.
Anhidrosis (Non-sweating horses)
No one has determined why some horses in the same environment stop sweating while others do sweat but we know that every horse is different with different responses to triggers. And no one (to my knowledge) has determined the mechanism behind anhydrosis.
Accidentally we have found a cure that seems to work in every horse we try it with and we need your help to give us more examples of this treatment’s success.
Aural Plaques
Aural plaques affect one or both ears creating a thick white crust inside the ear.
Dependent Edema
Blood, like any liquid, falls to the lowest point. When the liquid part of blood leaks out of the blood vessels, it always gravitates to the low point. It is usually a sign of general body inflammation that caused the vessels to leak.
Depigmentation (Leukotrichia)
The cause for the horse’s skin to lose color in patches of hair in one spot or throughout its body is not common and is still without explanation.
Dermatitis
Dermatitis In Horses
Equine Sarcoid
Equine Sarcoid is a benign tumor of the skin of the horse that is very common, usually limiting itself to above the knee and forward of the girth.
External Parasites
External Parasites In Horses
Fascial Tears
Fascial Tears In Horses
Habronemiasis (Summer Sores)
Inflammation caused by the biting stable fly that deposits the larvae of the habronema nematode producing moist sores on the eyes, mouth, nostrils, foreskin, and wounds.
Hematomas And Seromas
Hematomas And Seromas In Horses
Hives
Hives are small to medium sized flat lumps that occur locally or all over the horse’s body.
Insect Sensitivity
Insect sensitivity can range in degrees between different horses from mild to severe but is always during fly season.
Melanoma
Melanoma in horses is usually a benign tumor of the black skin of horses that occurs in many areas of the horse’s body but doesn’t metastasize.
Normal Hair Loss
Foals are born with a lot of hair that falls off during the spring and summer months. Recognizing this as a natural process will alleviate anxiety in a new foal owner.
Partial Skin Thickness Wounds
Surgery topics are items that help the horse owner understand the fundamentals behind wounds and surgical lesions in horses. This particular topic needs some information and the images updated. I am aiming for the end of September. Thank you for your patience.
Pressure Sores
When body weight is applied to the skin area for a prolonged period of time, the skin actually dies from the pressure placed upon it creating pressure sores.
Proud Flesh
This is a replay of a HorseTalk™ webcast. Be sure to enroll in the next one and join Doc T live.
Puncture Wounds
Puncture wounds can be invisible and inoculate the area with bacteria. If left untreated the infection can kill your horse. A tetanus vaccination is essential for puncture wounds.
Pythiosis
This severe disease is often confused with habronemiasis which is also commonly called summer sores. This is a fungus based, highly invasive cancer that can affect a horse anywhere on its body.
Rain Rot (Dermatophilosis)
Small, raised scabs on the back of a horse have a bacteria causing the lesion. The treatments recommended usually don’t cover the cause.
Ringworm (dermatophytosis)
Fungal infections can affect the skin of the horse and is contagious between horses and humans. There is usually an immunosuppression factor involved.
Scratches Or Grease Heel
Dermatitis, or inflammation of the skin, on the back side of the pastern can become severe in some horses. The usual treatments do not address the cause.
Sheath Edema
The sheath is at the farthest point from the heart and damage to the blood flow in castrated males can sometimes prevent the normal flow of blood leading to swelling (edema) of the sheath.
Shoe Boils
Shoe Boils In Horses
Skin Abscesses
The purpose of an abscess is to move a foreign material that is inside the body to the outside. When this occurs, it is said to be draining and is a natural and end-stage process.
Skin Lumps
In vet school I learned that a lump is a lump until proven otherwise. Only a biopsy can determine or confirm a diagnosis.
Skin Reactions To Veterinary Treatment
Some horses will react adversely to medications showing a disruption from the normal skin condition. These include bumps, depigmentation, and temporary inflammation.
Skin Scars
Scars occur during healing of full thickness skin wounds including surgery. They can range from unseen but felt to hairless, depigmented masses.
Squamous Cell Of The Skin
This common cancer is locally invasive on pink skin such as the eyes, penis, and in the skull of the horse.
Tack Injury
Skin rubs occur either acutely from trauma or insidiously through wear against objects such as tack, blankets, or the environment.
Tail Rubbing
Tail rubbing is common in stabled and non-stabled horses and the cause is simple as well as the solution. The frayed hairs at the tail head is evidence although most horses uncontrollably itch their rear ends in front of you.
Trauma Wounds
Traumatic wounds are different from surgical wounds for one major reason. The underlying trauma to the soft tissue complicates healing that is beyond the wound created by a sharp scalpel guided carefully by a surgeon’s hand.
Unknown Skin Lesions
Most skin diseases in horses are ignored and random treatments are applied or the lesion is ignored. Here are a few of these.
Warts
Warts are virus caused growths on the skin usually on young horses and usually on the lips and muzzle.
Wire Wounds
Wire wounds are difficult because of the underlying soft tissue damage that wants to slough off before the wound can close.
Posts
A Better Approach To Parasite Control
From an email to me: Hi Dr. Tucker, Yes, I wonder about your recommendations per worming horses. It is springtime. I would think worming will change the pH of the stomach, so want some input as to how to proceed. Thanks. My response: Life is always a balance between...
No Sweat!
I mean, no sweat as in your horse has stopped sweating. For anyone in the latitudes where it never gets above 85 degrees F or the humidity is moderate, you will never know what I’m talking about. I wish I had a picture of the first horse I had actually known with...
Sweating Again In 3 Days – Testimonial
This is areport from the owner of a 27 year horse being fed with care but will not sweat in the summer heat. “I know you wanted an update on how he was doing so this is what I’ve got so far: Well, we’ve completed the 1 week “diet reset” where I...
Podcasts
Wounds In Horses-Podcast #043
This is a review of what kind of wounds occur in the horse, what needs to be done about them and how to make them heal with the best possible outcomes. In a nutshell, there are partial skin thickness wounds and full thickness wounds. Partial skin thickness wounds can...
Webinars
No Results Found
The page you requested could not be found. Try refining your search, or use the navigation above to locate the post.
Topics
*An Introduction To The Horse Skin And Hair (Integument) System And Diseases
The purposes of skin and hair are many and equally important. They keep everything inside in and everything outside out. It grows hair and adds fat to keep us warm and it sweats to keep us cool. It senses movement and helps to feel the blades of grass that are succulent. It shakes off flies and screams for attention when it is damaged. It remains flexible around joints but firm over muscles and the face.
Abnormal Skin Features
This topic covers anything that isn’t considered normal on the skin of the horse and is not categorized into another topic.
Anhidrosis (Non-sweating horses)
No one has determined why some horses in the same environment stop sweating while others do sweat but we know that every horse is different with different responses to triggers. And no one (to my knowledge) has determined the mechanism behind anhydrosis.
Accidentally we have found a cure that seems to work in every horse we try it with and we need your help to give us more examples of this treatment’s success.
Aural Plaques
Aural plaques affect one or both ears creating a thick white crust inside the ear.
Dependent Edema
Blood, like any liquid, falls to the lowest point. When the liquid part of blood leaks out of the blood vessels, it always gravitates to the low point. It is usually a sign of general body inflammation that caused the vessels to leak.
Depigmentation (Leukotrichia)
The cause for the horse’s skin to lose color in patches of hair in one spot or throughout its body is not common and is still without explanation.
Dermatitis
Dermatitis In Horses
Equine Sarcoid
Equine Sarcoid is a benign tumor of the skin of the horse that is very common, usually limiting itself to above the knee and forward of the girth.
External Parasites
External Parasites In Horses
Fascial Tears
Fascial Tears In Horses
Habronemiasis (Summer Sores)
Inflammation caused by the biting stable fly that deposits the larvae of the habronema nematode producing moist sores on the eyes, mouth, nostrils, foreskin, and wounds.
Hematomas And Seromas
Hematomas And Seromas In Horses
Hives
Hives are small to medium sized flat lumps that occur locally or all over the horse’s body.
Insect Sensitivity
Insect sensitivity can range in degrees between different horses from mild to severe but is always during fly season.
Melanoma
Melanoma in horses is usually a benign tumor of the black skin of horses that occurs in many areas of the horse’s body but doesn’t metastasize.
Normal Hair Loss
Foals are born with a lot of hair that falls off during the spring and summer months. Recognizing this as a natural process will alleviate anxiety in a new foal owner.
Partial Skin Thickness Wounds
Surgery topics are items that help the horse owner understand the fundamentals behind wounds and surgical lesions in horses. This particular topic needs some information and the images updated. I am aiming for the end of September. Thank you for your patience.
Pressure Sores
When body weight is applied to the skin area for a prolonged period of time, the skin actually dies from the pressure placed upon it creating pressure sores.
Proud Flesh
This is a replay of a HorseTalk™ webcast. Be sure to enroll in the next one and join Doc T live.
Puncture Wounds
Puncture wounds can be invisible and inoculate the area with bacteria. If left untreated the infection can kill your horse. A tetanus vaccination is essential for puncture wounds.
Pythiosis
This severe disease is often confused with habronemiasis which is also commonly called summer sores. This is a fungus based, highly invasive cancer that can affect a horse anywhere on its body.
Rain Rot (Dermatophilosis)
Small, raised scabs on the back of a horse have a bacteria causing the lesion. The treatments recommended usually don’t cover the cause.
Ringworm (dermatophytosis)
Fungal infections can affect the skin of the horse and is contagious between horses and humans. There is usually an immunosuppression factor involved.
Scratches Or Grease Heel
Dermatitis, or inflammation of the skin, on the back side of the pastern can become severe in some horses. The usual treatments do not address the cause.
Sheath Edema
The sheath is at the farthest point from the heart and damage to the blood flow in castrated males can sometimes prevent the normal flow of blood leading to swelling (edema) of the sheath.
Shoe Boils
Shoe Boils In Horses
Skin Abscesses
The purpose of an abscess is to move a foreign material that is inside the body to the outside. When this occurs, it is said to be draining and is a natural and end-stage process.
Skin Lumps
In vet school I learned that a lump is a lump until proven otherwise. Only a biopsy can determine or confirm a diagnosis.
Skin Reactions To Veterinary Treatment
Some horses will react adversely to medications showing a disruption from the normal skin condition. These include bumps, depigmentation, and temporary inflammation.
Skin Scars
Scars occur during healing of full thickness skin wounds including surgery. They can range from unseen but felt to hairless, depigmented masses.
Squamous Cell Of The Skin
This common cancer is locally invasive on pink skin such as the eyes, penis, and in the skull of the horse.
Tack Injury
Skin rubs occur either acutely from trauma or insidiously through wear against objects such as tack, blankets, or the environment.
Tail Rubbing
Tail rubbing is common in stabled and non-stabled horses and the cause is simple as well as the solution. The frayed hairs at the tail head is evidence although most horses uncontrollably itch their rear ends in front of you.
Trauma Wounds
Traumatic wounds are different from surgical wounds for one major reason. The underlying trauma to the soft tissue complicates healing that is beyond the wound created by a sharp scalpel guided carefully by a surgeon’s hand.
Unknown Skin Lesions
Most skin diseases in horses are ignored and random treatments are applied or the lesion is ignored. Here are a few of these.
Warts
Warts are virus caused growths on the skin usually on young horses and usually on the lips and muzzle.
Wire Wounds
Wire wounds are difficult because of the underlying soft tissue damage that wants to slough off before the wound can close.
Posts
A Better Approach To Parasite Control
From an email to me: Hi Dr. Tucker, Yes, I wonder about your recommendations per worming horses....
No Sweat!
I mean, no sweat as in your horse has stopped sweating. For anyone in the latitudes where it never...
Sweating Again In 3 Days – Testimonial
This is areport from the owner of a 27 year horse being fed with care but will not sweat in the...
Podcasts
Wounds In Horses-Podcast #043
This is a review of what kind of wounds occur in the horse, what needs to be done about them and...
Webinars
No Results Found
The page you requested could not be found. Try refining your search, or use the navigation above to locate the post.