Cervical Vertebral Stenotic Myelopathy
Basic Information 
Epidemiology
• Horses affected with CVSM often present at a young age (younger than age 2 years), although some horses may not be identified until 5 years or older.
• Some investigators suggest bony malformation may be a result of developmental abnormalities such as osteochondrosis affecting the articular process joints of the cervical vertebral column with subsequent instability and hypertrophy of the soft tissues such as the ligamentum flavum and other support structures associated with the vertebral column.
• Osteochondrosis is a disturbance in endochondral ossification in rapidly growing animal species and humans. Diet appears to be a factor in this condition as well as in other developmental orthopedic problems affecting the appendicular skeleton of horses.
• The higher incidence in Thoroughbreds and a few other breeds suggests an inherited basis, although characterization of the mode of inheritance has not been completed to date. In addition to diet and a role of genetic predisposition, gender, rate of growth, endocrine dysfunction, and biomechanical stress have also been incriminated.
Risk Factors
• Important risk factors are described above; however, a very important factor appears to be diet. In some studies, the incidence of osteochondrosis affecting the vertebral articular process joints of the cervical vertebrae was nearly six times as frequent in foals born to mares fed and foals raised on diets lower in copper than in a similar group fed a diet much higher in copper.
• Other important factors are the glycemic index of the diet, the gender of the foals, trauma, and the rate of growth.
Clinical Presentation
Disease Forms/Subtypes
• This condition is observed as a developmental disease in which malformation and malarticulation of cervical vertebrae result in compression of the spinal cord. The condition appears to be multifactorial, and the higher incidence in Thoroughbred horses suggests a genetic predisposition.
• The observation of the problem most often in young growing horses, male more often than female, that are fed high-carbohydrate diets that may be deficient in copper or contain excess zinc supports the idea of a multifactorial cause for this condition.
• The second group of affected horses are generally older and have osteoarthritic enlargements of the articular processes.
Stay updated, free articles. Join our Telegram channel
Full access? Get Clinical Tree
