Water treadmills/ hydrotherapy , good or bad?

[Hoof_Prints]

The idea of hydrotherapy sounds great in rehabilitating horses with injuries or simply building up fitness without the concussion of working on hard ground, but although it works well for humans/other animals is it suitable for horses? (I can't remember how this was described properly, I'll give it a go! ) the locomotion of a horse is not like other mammals such as humans, dogs or cats, they do not have muscles in the lower leg and their movement is based around storing and releasing of elastic energy, causing a tension and release mechanism that makes the leg "snap up" like an elastic band and absorb motion. Compared to humans, horse's tendons are long and much more elastic and do not have the support of the muscle. How it was explained to me is that working in water adds resistance and therefore strain on the tendon and ligaments as the elastic tension meets the resistance of water. Just wondered what other people's thoughts were.. it makes good sense to me but I have not taken any time to research it properly and I am interested to hear what people on here say, I am sure it was either my vet or a physiotherapist that told me this and I've been pondering it. Hope I've explained it well enough to understand,

Thoughts?

 

[Equi]

As far as I know most pools only let the horse swim for about 5mins in each direction cause it's quite hard work on them. That's what I was told anyway when I moved into my house which had a horse pool (dad, the bright spark he is, filled it in thinking no one would pay to use a horse pool.....he also knocked down 20 stables. He hates me...he's got to hate me...)

 

[only_me]

Re. Water treadmills
I would have said that the water adds extra resistance to normal muscle movement (talking above knee) so it's more difficult for the horse to walk which will make the muscles work harder over a short period.

The height of the water is the amount of resistance added; a low level of water (say below hoof) would have less resistance for the muscles to work against than a higher level of water (say above the fetlock). The higher the water level the higher the resistance which means the muscles will have to work harder.

Therefore the resistance added to lower leg makes the whole movement of walking more difficult, so the whole body is moving = all muscles moving. Some are obviously moving more than others. This will increase the load (force) placed on the muscles so the muscles will increase in strength relative to the resistance.

I think it's a great method of rehab as it's low impact with hopefully high yield, but needs to be done slowly to build up the muscles/tendon elasticity otherwise will be too much pressure and could cause damage. Needs to be done along side other forms of rehab

But that's my view anyway

 

[be positive]

My physio wanted me to do some hydrotherapy when my horse was in rehab as part of the whole treatment plan but there was nowhere in my area that had either a treadmill or spa so I ended up hiring a local xc course a few times and walking him for half an hour or so through the huge water complex which seemed to be helpful but not as good as a treadmill or spa, swimming would not have been suitable for mine.