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Osteochondral injury and joint disease in the athletic horse
Author(s) -
Riggs C. M.
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
equine veterinary education
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.304
H-Index - 31
eISSN - 2042-3292
pISSN - 0957-7734
DOI - 10.1111/j.2042-3292.2006.tb00426.x
Subject(s) - club , medicine , library science , citation , veterinary medicine , advertising , computer science , business , anatomy
Joint disease is common in horses. The careers of many performance horses are impaired or prematurely curtailed as a consequence of lameness due to arthritides. Osteoarthritis, characterised by progressive and permanent disease of articular cartilage and associated bone and soft tissues of the joint, represents one end-stage of a series of pathological processes, which may be initiated by joint trauma (Mcllwraith 1996). In other cases, more acute injuries, such as osteochondral fracture, may arise as a consequence of weakening of the tissues of the joint following chronic, cyclical loading (Pool 1996). The fact that it is not possible to predict reliably the pathological outcome of similar injuries to different joints reflects our incomplete understanding of the disease processes involved. The diarthrodial joint can be considered as a complex organ in which several different tissue components, ligaments (intraand extra-articular), fibrous joint capsule, synovial membrane, hyaline cartilage (nonmineralised and mineralised) and bone, form a functional unit. It is increasingly recognised that there are complex biomechanical and biochemical interactions between all the components of the joint and the large number of permutations that can result from varying degrees of involvement of each tissue may partially account for the unpredictable pathological consequences of joint injuries. The complex interaction of different tissues is also a confounding factor in experimental studies designed to investigate mechanisms of joint disease, especially those conducted in vitro. Despite these limitations, significant advances have been made over recent years in understanding the pathological processes involved following joint injury. The purpose of this article is to review some of the more important pathological processes involved following traumatic injury to the osteochondral tissues of a joint, highlighting some outstanding issues which require further investigation.