Mesotherapy has been used in veterinary practices in the United States to treat horses with chronic back pain since 2002, but was originally developed in France in 1952 to treat human patients. It is also effective in treating degenerative arthritis in a horse’s back and the cervical vertebrae. It helps by reversing the physiology of these conditions to stop the pain spasm cycle.
Mesotherapy consists of injections on both sides of the spine into the middle layer of skin. The veterinarian will generally administer three rows of injections on each side of the horse’s spine resulting in 200-300 injection sites. These injections, while many, only penetrate the skin about four to six millimeters, and extremely small needles are employed.
The number of treatments required for a horse with chronic back pain is dependent on several factors: the overall condition of the horse, the cause of the horse’s back pain, the severity of the back pain, and how persistent the problem. Generally, you can expect one to two treatments, with the full effect of treatment being seen in 7-10 days. Determining whether a horse with chronic back pain will need to have the procedure repeated in the future is dependent on the factors mentioned above.
Watch Dr. Burny Baxter administer mesotherapy on our YouTube channel or read about one of our patients who had Mesotherapy treatment, and then went on to win Congress just 10 days later.