Soil Selenium Levels and Equine White Muscle Disease

Foals with a selenium deficiency are at risk of developing white muscle disease, which leads to skeletal and cardiac muscle abnormalities.
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Soil Selenium Levels and Equine White Muscle Disease
Even in adequate selenium areas, the chemical form of soil selenium might not be readily available to plants and, thus, contribute to deficiencies in animals grazing those plants or hay produced from the field. | Photo: iStock
Does your horses reside in a selenium-deficient area? If they do, and they’re broodmares, their foals’ health could be at risk.

Foals depend on their dams for dietary selenium. And foals with a selenium deficiency are at risk of developing white muscle disease, which leads to skeletal and cardiac muscle abnormalities. It typically affects foals up to weanling age and has a fatality rate ranging from 30 to 45%.

In an attempt to provide geographical insight into managing and preventing white muscle disease, Catherine Delesalle, DVM, PhD, Dipl. ECEIM, and colleagues from Ghent University, in Belgium, collected data from eight foals with white muscle disease that were admitted to Wolvega Equine Hospital, in The Netherlands.

All foals presented with increased muscle enzymes indicative of the disease and clinical signs including muscle weakness, inadequate suckle reflex, and lethargy. All foals received general supportive care and medication upon arrival, and six received a selenium and vitamin E injection. Two foals did not survive, and post-mortem findings confirmed muscle histopathology (cell structure when viewed under a microscope) consistent with white muscle disease

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Kristen M. Janicki, a lifelong horsewoman, was born and raised in the suburbs of Chicago. She received her Bachelor of Science degree in Animal Sciences from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and later attended graduate school at the University of Kentucky, studying under Dr. Laurie Lawrence in the area of Equine Nutrition. Kristen has been a performance horse nutritionist for an industry feed manufacturer for more than a decade. Her job entails evaluating and improving the performance of the sport horse through proper nutrition.

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