The prevalence of narrowing of the dorsal nerve root foramen.

Abstract

The equine thoracolumbar spine is an area where several types of osseous pathologies are found. It is still a challenging job to find the exact location of the pain and the possible underlying pathologies. Focusing on the intervertebral foramina and its osteophyt forming, which could interfere with the dorsal nerve branches. Can the closure of the dorsal nerve root foramen be correlated with back pain? Twenty horses (mean ±SD age: 13.8±8.6; 10 geldings, 10 mares) were presented to the clinic for euthanasia. They were scored on back pain through a standard protocol. After euthanasia the spine from Th16 – S4 ware obtained and prepared for scoring the grade of the intervertebral foramina. The correlation with back pain when more than 30% of the spine was affected (grade 3 or 4) was calculated using logistic regression. There is a greater chance (3.33 times higher) for horses with both thoracic and lumbar affected vertebrae to get back pain. Due to the small group of horses no significance was displayed. It would be interesting to see if specific pathology in the spine is correlated with age and if, as in humans, the musculus multifidus undergoes atrophy if the patient has back pain.