Motion detection technology identifies lameness in horses

The Lameness Locator, developed by Kevin Keegan, a professor of equine surgery at the University of Missouri-Columbia, places small sensors on the horse’s head, right front limb and croup, near the tail.

The commercially available system monitors and record the horse’s torso movement while the horse is trotting.

According to the university, the recorded information is then transferred to a computer or mobile device and compared against databases recorded from the movement of healthy horses and other lame horses.  

The computer is then able to diagnose whether or not the horse is lame.

In a new study published in the Equine Veterinary Journal, Keegan and co-author Meghan McCracken, an equine surgery resident at the university, put adjustable shoes on horses that temporarily induced symptoms of lameness.

The horses were then monitored by the Lameness Locator as well as by a number of veterinarians using any lameness testing methods they wished.

If no lameness was detected by either the veterinarians or the Lameness Locator, the shoes were adjusted slightly to increase the symptoms of lameness.