Structure Versus Function – let’s ditch the common term “conformation”, shall we??

There are a few words commonly used in the horse industry that absolutely make me cringe. The one I’m going to highlight today has a lot of misconceptions and conclusions around it that quite frankly, are just not true. People argue over it, they try to sell horses by it and they even try to assume it’s a “permanent” feature of their horse. WRONG. Ready for it?

Conformation.
*shudder*

Now if we look up the Oxford Dictionary definition of the word, it tells us the following:
NOUN
1. the shape or structure of something, especially an animal:
“the judges run their hands over the dog’s body and legs, checking its conformation”

Conformation is what you cannot change! The things you cannot change would be things like the length of the back, where the neck ascends out of the body, how long the bones are and for the most part, the angle at which these bones come into each joint. This is Structural Conformation.
Everything else is what we would label as a functional compensation (don’t forget compensation is not necessarily negative) due to the horse’s exercise regime, rider capabilities, environment or injuries, etc.

Majority of what we see in horses would fall under the label of functional compensation. Some classic examples of “conformation labels” that are compensations would be:

• Ewe Neck – this is where C7 & TH1 have “fallen” due to repeated inversion of the horses head & neck, and hollowing out of the back.
• Hunters Bump – Where the sacrum falls into a “nutation” (the front part tips down) and the Lumbar vertebrae compensate by L6 dropping and then L5 – 1 raising to form that “bump”.
• Toeing in or out on any limb – of course this can be caused by poor farrier work, but we also must look at the muscles and which ones are working too hard, or not enough.
• Sway back (usually! I have seen two foals born already in a sway – although other things were wrong with them, too)
• A human example would be Scoliosis. While it can be structural, more commonly it is functional and can be reversed through proper rehabilitation.

When we look at a horse, either as a therapist, trainer, Instructor or to purchase, our job is to look for what is unchangeable about this horse and can we live with it. Examples would be the length of the back, the angles of the pastern bones, the size of the pelvis and angle at which the femur is set coming out of it, the length and angle of the scapula and how the cervical neck vertebrae emerge from the body. I cannot change those things. The Structural Conformation could be contrasted in a Quarter Horse versus a Saddlebred, or a Draft Horse versus an Arabian.

Next, we must identify what we can change – which is just about everything else. We look for the functional compensations that we can begin unwinding and bringing into balance. This takes a trained eye, good feel and; the knowledge of the physiology and working anatomy of the horse to put it all together. In our line of work as Equine Remedial Therapists, we may look for which muscles is this horse over using, and which ones is he not using at all? Is there an injury present? Is there scar tissue in the fascia or muscles that are restricting movement? Is this horse being asked to move in balance and correctly? Are his feet balanced and the same on all four? There are a lot of questions to ask before we begin a game plan of setting this horse back up correctly.

But wait! It gets a little more complicated.

Structure = Function AND Function = Structure

WHOA! What does that even mean!?

We’re working on a short video series to start walking you through how to spot structure versus function. We hope we can help you start to train your eye and learn how to navigate anatomy with a little more ease! Do you have questions, comment here! We love hearing from you!

Stay tuned…

Categories: Equine Rehab
 
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