Body condition scoring is something every horse owner and trainer should know how to use in order to evaluate if a horse is too skinny or too fat, says Jessica Normand, senior director of equine health for SmartPak.

Researchers in Vienna examined the utility of using heart rate and heart rate variability to estimate the degree of pain felt by 12 horses with clinically obvious laminitis compared to five unaffected control horses. In addition, heart rates were compared to the Obel pain scale, historically used to describe the severity of laminitis pain where “1” is used for horses that shift their weight from one foot to another while standing or are lame only at a trot and “4” is used for horses that are very reluctant or refuse to move.