I use a massage therapist one a month for my daughter's 17 year QH. He absolutely loves it almost to the point of going to sleep while she's working on him. Its well worth the price and most will give you a discount if you buy a series of massages. If you have a really good one, they will teach you what to do inbetween to help with stretching and touch. Ours actually taught my daughter how to do pretty much what she did on a smaller level.
When that therapist gets the right spot on a horse, you watch-its amazing. They lower their head, take a deep breath and say ';thank you'; :)
We also use acuputure for arthritis. Its wonderful. Just make sure you use a certified acuputurist (they are equine vets with more extensive training).
*** I didn't read your question thoroughly enough* I just realized you use one anyway. Hope your horse enjoys it as much as ours.Equine Chiropractors and massage therapists?
I hung out with an equine chiropractor and acupuncturist for a few days, to see what the medicine was like, and it was amazing. And contrary to popular belief about this field, this doctor was an accredited DVM AND an old cowboy! We visited several patients with lameness and muscle strain and back injuries, and he worked [in conjunction with!] each patient's regular vet to provide routine physical therapy for them. The results were immediate and very obvious - the patients would sigh and relax and shake and munch afterward, whereas before treatment they would be standing stiffly, uncomfortably, and with a strained expression on their face.
When used with correct surgical, drug, and medical treatment, chiropractics and acupuncture can really work wonders in pain management and recovery when in the hands of an experienced veterinarian.
I have a 5 year old x racer who when I got him had a huge bulge in his neck and he was very stiff in his hips. My trainer recommended I use this chiropractor to adjust him and it was AMAZING. when she worked his neck you could hear 7 loud pops and then he got goose bumps all over him after the pressure was relieved. The same thing happened in his hips. he was great for about 8 months and then he started to get a sore back right over his kidney area.
Next I had a message therapist come out and work on him for several sessions. He enjoyed it and it was getting better but it wouldn't fully resolve so I called the chiropractor again and she came out to adjust him. She also did some acupuncture on him. I gave him 2 weeks off to let him heal completely and he has been fine ever since.
So, to answer your question, I am a strong believer in these techniques.
I have the message therapist check on him every once in a while but he is reporting that my horse is doing great. If there is something wrong with him, my horse always lets me know.
Haven't used one. But we plan on having a massage therapists out for our two senior horses to ease their arthritis/old age. Wanted to get a chiropractor but they are difficult to get where we live. I've yet to hear a bad report from anyone I know who has used one. Really looking forward to easing the ancients discomfort. I'll be monitoring this questions to check your other responses, I'm anxious to see what kind of results others have gotten. Thanks for the question. God Bless.
Last year I purchased a Arab/paint gelding from a riding school,they told me he came from non-horsey people,the school had him for 18 months , they didn't tell me he was terrified of men,anyway when we unloaded him he ducked his bum under the back bar and jammed himself up to the wither! whilr squeeling and tring to rear.My husband tried to pull him foreward bum him being male made horse worse,husband got out of float ,horse walked foreward!I walked him off surprised he could walk ,I honestly thaught he'd broken his back! A chiro told me he was fine ride him in a week.
Anyway I got a massage theripist to him the improvement was awesome! it took time but my horse went from taking tiny baby steps to a flat out hoon in 6 months. without it he would have had to be put down,massage saved my horses life
,he is good as new now, and has forgiven my husband for being a male!!!
my mare was off-the-track so she has issues with her suspensories which causes her back and back legs to be sensitive. basically it just made her buck when we did certain things, mainly flying lead changes.
so we got a chiropractor out and she told us about her suspensories and after that the bucking was minimal or none at all. it worked for about a year, which is pretty long. so we do it every year, and its worked very well.
also, where i used to board the owner had her older horses massaged a lot, because her friend did it for free. it helped them a lot, as well as the young horses too. they really do enjoy it, too :]
OK so, at the moment I'm horseless. My poor baby died 6 months ago. :[ But, a friend of mine uses a wonderful massage therapist, and it has worked wonders on her quarter horse mare. She has improved 95% in just the 3 months that this lady has been working on her. How your horse behaves has a tremendous amount to do with it's comfort level. If it's tack is uncomfortable or it has sore muscles, obviously it's not going to be thrilled about carrying a person around for any length of time. They're just like people. If you have a sore back, don't you get cranky. I know I do. Just because horses are animals, doesn't mean their muscles are any different from ours.
I have seen amaxing results with horses that have had chiro. work done. I used it to support a horse that had EPM and wasn't repsponding to conventiomal treatment. It did not cure him, but it did make him more comfortable. And that was enough for me
I have also used alternative medicine on my senior dogs and have scene a remarkable recovery. Again it will not cure an animal but can help them greatly~
good luck!
For chiro- I have and still use them on my show mule for intermittent lameness issues from what we think is a pinched subscapular nerve. The farrier aggrevates it and the chiro fixes it and hes good to go.
For massages- I actually bought a book of Amazon for doing your own and I have pretty patient animals that let me practice at a time. They don't seem to mind. There is a thing I use that you can get in one of the horse tack magazings, that is a 3 prong massager, my show mule LOVES that thing, and I use it on him reguarly, it just stays in my truck.
Hi there, I was really sceptical about equine chiro until I saw the results! Was living in the US and saw a guy work on some horses and it inspired me to take the human and equine chiro course! seen great results from my work and other chiros. massage is equally as important as the muscles can be chronic problems and also need to be addressed. everything from lig probs, breathing probs and behaviour probs can respond. big believer in all the alternative stuff! Hope this helps!
Over the summer we went camping and my mare has recently learned how to untie herself (with any knot, every single knot we've tried, quick-release, boat knots, it's really annoying) and she was free one night and something spooked her. In the morning we found her seven kilometres down the road. Later that day my brother and I went for a ride, just a quick bareback ride, but she stumbled and started limping pretty bad. We moved camping spots but we didn't ride her once for the rest of the trip. When we got back home she got better but after about a week she could barely walk. So we called a chiro out, and after seriously only one session she was 95% better. I took her for a quick bareback ride one day, and while we were taking a break at my dad's truck, she moved and her entire back cracked. She was fine after that, she was even feeling good enough to buck me off that day.
i think there is good and bad.
i worked for a trainer a few years back. a soft tissue therapist came out and worked on the horses (he owned like 6 that were in training with her). for one thing, it was amazing. i strongly suggest anyone who has a horse with a problem that no one can fix to get a soft tissue therapist to work on it. you really could feel a difference with the horses. but heres the bad thing. we had one horse who was great. he was a 13 year old eq horse, very well trained, owned by Gisele Bunchen the model. however, if this horse missed even one session, he was dead lame. i think a lot of horses become accostumed to the work being done, and then cant even function without it. it was very sad.
but i do think they help in certain situations
I am so for the equine massages! I have 2 ex-race horses and 1 old boy, and once while my ex-race horse named Cliff,was getting his monthly massage, his whole spine cracked. Like I knew that racing payed a pretty big toll on their backs but i never knew this much. It was such a sight! He hunched his back up like a cat, and all of a sudden we heard a crack!crack! Crack! only like 40 times really fast. His vertibrates released all the pressure that they had stored form racing. I think that his massages has also helped loosen his muscles in his neck because am achievieng a very nice headset now! I also think it is a very good boding activity. We also had a scent-oligist come out and she brought out tons of incense and let the horses smell them and then once she was done, she wrote up a little summary about which ones Cliff liked and which ones he didn't like.
And for people out there who say that its ';pampering them too much'; u obviously don't know anything because if humans can get massages, then so can horses!
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