Myofascial Release

My-o-what?  Yep, that is what I was saying too.  A while back Duke got caught up in the temporary fence so I decided to call a chiropractor to take a look at him.  I have used chiropractors in the past however lately when I've heard people talking about them the name Trish kept coming up.  After talking to some friends I finally got a number for Trish and scheduled an appointment.

Trish isn't your typical "crack'em" chiropractor.  She works more on soft tissue manipulations and what she calls myofascial release or MFR.  I must say when she was working on Duke I wasn't overly impressed as it looked like she was just touching Duke softly and not really manipulating anything.  Oh how I was wrong!

Prior to the fence incident Duke's back legs were nice and straight but after the incident his back right had started to toe out.  He seemed lethargic and just wasn't Duke.  I mentioned the leg to Trish and before she left it was straight again!  Trish worked on Duke 3 times and he's back to his normal ornery self.

I now have Trish working on Lucy.  I've always had issues w/Lucy's back right leg but since she isn't blatantly lame the vets don't seem to think it is a big deal.  Within the first session Lucy was walking better, more freely in the back end then I've ever seen her walk.  I'm so excited to see how Lucy will perform next year now that she is feeling better.

Here is some information about MFR.

Myofascial release is a manual therapy technique that is used to elongate foreshortened connective tissue and muscle. Fascia is another term for the connective tissue of the body that forms a three-dimensional system of support, cushion, and movement. The fascial system forms a web from head to hoof surrounding every muscle, bone, organ, blood vessel, nerve, and cell. Actually, muscle is made up of 98% connective tissue with biochemicals attached that produce a shortening of the connective tissue strands (contraction). When the horse is acutely injured or sustains repeated trauma from training, the fascial system tightens as a protective response.
Over time this can lead to poor muscular biomechanics, altered structural alignment, decreased strength and endurance, and produce overuse muscular compensations. Resultant is decreased performance and functional capacity of the horse. By elongating the fascial system we can restore the efficiency of this system. Therefore, restoring the natural abilities of coordination, strength, and power to the horse. During treatment the therapist identifies areas of hardness or tenderness and applies a gentle pressure into the tissue were the restriction is felt. This is held for 90-120 seconds following the releases through the connective tissue barriers. We have had great success with this treatment approach especially when utilized with other treatment techniques such as joint mobilization, therapeutic exercise programs, and modalities. The combination of these techniques are beneficial in creating pain free movement for the horse.

Here are some before/after videos of a horse I found on youtube (I have no clue who this horse is) that received treatment using MFR.

Here is the same horse after MRF.

Lucy isn't where this horse is YET but she's sure feeling better then she did.  She's striding out further then she ever has (just not quite as much as I'd like).

I get to have Trish work on me tomorrow so I'm excited to "feel" what Lucy feels.