The Role of Nutrition in Managing Muscle Disorders

In combination with exercise, nutrition is an essential component of managing horses with myopathies. The optimal feeding program for an individual horse is tailored to the diagnosis of a specific underlying myopathy.

The key points of this article include:

• Horses with exertional rhabdomyolysis caused by types 1 and 2 polysaccharide storage myopathy (PSSM1 and PSSM2-ER) benefit from low nonstructural carbohydrate (NSC) diets and supplementary fat as a metabolizable form of energy.
• Horses with recurrent exertional rhabdomyolysis can be managed by lowering NSC, but not to the extreme of PSSM, and then replacing needed calories with fat.
• Arabian horses with myofibrillar myopathy (MFM-ER) can be managed with moderate NSC, supplementary fat, amino acids, and antioxidants N-acetylcysteine and coenzyme Q10.
• Warmblood horses with MFM benefit from a similar diet to MFM-ER horses but with less additional fat.

 

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