Screening technology used for humans a success for Sherbert the horse – Cornwall Live

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In July 2016, dressage competitor Sherbert the horse was having subtle and occasional lameness issues which owner Libby Gill said was "frustrating" because "one day, or literally one minute he would be fine, the next he would feel lame".

Lameness is an abnormal stance of an animal, usually caused by pain or a mechanical dysfunction. Sherbert suffered from it so badly during a competition at the Badminton Championships last year, that Libby and him were unable to continue despite the lameness being random.

Vets were unable to diagnose Sherbert because, when taken to the vet, he was not appearing lame. Libby was told she had to make Sherbert lame before the vet was able to help, but this was impossible as the lameness would occur on a random basis.

After a chance conversation with a friend Libby heard about Sync Thermology. A type of physiological screening that has been successful for humans for ten years and developed into a service that is accessible for use in veterinary medicine.

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Libby, from Truro, contacted Louisa Jenkins, from Camborne, the Cornwall technician for Sync Thermology.

"Thermography is essentially a test of physiology," Louisa said. "It measures the sympathetic nervous response and detects physiological abnormalities and inflammatory responses."

After consulting the vet Libby took Sherbert to Louisa, who has screening facilities in her yard with medically graded cameras also used on humans.

Louisa Jenkin, Cornwall technician for Sync Thermology.

"I took Sherbert to Louisa's yard as she has the proper facilities there to do it, and it only took about an hour and a half in total from start to finish," Libby said.

"I got the report back really quickly and it identified a few things for us to investigate. I am really pleased my friend mentioned this service to me as without it I might still be going around in circled trying to get to the bottom of it all."

Louisa said she screened Sherbert before and after letting him move around so the screen would show the physiological differences before and after work.

"You see the images and then send them through to our team of vets who interpret the images," Louisa added. "They are also trained in thermography and have interpretation software."

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The interpretation software allows the vets to pinpoint areas of distress or increased blood flow to certain areas of the animals.

She said pinpointing certain areas has helped vets in the past discover hairline stress fractures related to the area of increased blood flow in the animal.

Sync Thermology has been used on dogs, giraffes and other animals in the zoo. "There are technicians all over the country," Louisa said. "So it's pretty much a national coverage."

Louisa said this service was popular because of the little harm it brings to animals and the fact it is the only form of physiological screening which assists vets in pinpointing a problem.

After taking Sherbert to Louisa and having his issues resolved through the screening, the pair have since had a very successful Winter Dressage Championship in Hartpury in April this year. They were placed fourth in the Preliminary Area Festival Final.

"It was such a great weekend and fantastic experience," Libby said. "Sherbert was really on form and pulled it out of the bag just at the right time, I'm delighted."

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Screening technology used for humans a success for Sherbert the horse - Cornwall Live