In my experience, box rest is generally more stressful for the owner than it is for the horse. Having said that, there are very definitely horses who struggle with it. Sometimes the effects can be long lasting. That makes it important to do our best to reduce the risks of stress related behaviour from the beginning, rather than trying to resolve them once they’ve started.

Mostly when we think of box rest, we worry that our horse is going to be unsettled. It’s important to consider the physical aspects as well. In this book we’ve talked about recognising the risks around feeding, musculoskeletal health, dentistry, farriery and more.

As always, the team supporting your horse are a key element in successful rehabilitation. If you already have a team in place before the box rest started, all the better. The team members will know you and your horse. They’ll know what’s normal and what’s not normal. They’ll be able to advise you on what you could put in place to prevent problems, instead of waiting for the problems to arise. It’s likely they’ve known many horses on box rest.

If you’ve found this book helpful, please share it with others. Together, we can make the world a better place for horses.

I’m Sue Palmer. My mission is to inspire compassion, through sharing knowledge, experience and understanding. If you have a question you’d like answered, please get in touch.

I’m an ACPAT and RAMP registered Chartered Physiotherapist, a British Horse Society Stage 3 Coach in Complete Horsemanship (BHSAI), and an Intelligent Horsemanship Recommended Trainer.

If you’d like to hear more from me, you can find The Horse Physio on Facebook @The Horse Physio, Instagram @suepalmerthehorsephysio, and YouTube at The Horse Physio. You can visit my website, www.thehorsephysio.co.uk, and check out my books ‘Understanding Horse Performance: Brain, Pain or Training?’ and ‘Horse Massage for Horse Owners’.

I’m an ACPAT (www.acpat.org) and RAMP registered (www.rampregister.org) Chartered Physiotherapist (www.csp.org), a British Horse Society Stage 3 Coach in Complete Horsemanship (BHSAI, www.bhs.org.uk), and an Intelligent Horsemanship Recommended Trainer (www.intelligenthorsemanship.co.uk).

© Sue Palmer, The Horse Physio 2021

Treating your horse with care, connection, curiosity and compassion