Bilateral asymmetry of equine laryngeal muscles

Abstract

Abstract Extract Recent work (Gunn, 1972 Gunn, H. M. 1972. Histochemical observations on laryngeal skeletal muscle fibres in “normal horses. Equine vet. J., 4: 144–148. [Crossref], [PubMed] , [Google Scholar], 1973 Gunn, H. M. 1973. Further observations on laryngeal skeletal muscle in the horse. Equine vet. J., 5: 77–84. [Google Scholar]; Duncan and Griffiths, 1973 Duncan, I. D. and Griffiths, I. R. 1973. Pathological changes in equine laryngeal muscles and nerves. Proc. 19th Ann. Conf. Am. Ass. Equine Pract., : 97–113. [Google Scholar]; Duncan et al., 1974 Duncan, I. D., Griffiths, I. R., McQueen, A. and Backer, G. O. 1974. The pathology of equine laryngeal hemiplegia. Acta neuropath. (Berl.), 27: 337–348. [Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) supports Cole's (1946 Cole, C. R. 1946. Changes in the equine larynx associated with laryngeal hemiplegia. Am. J. vet. Res., 8: 69–77. [Google Scholar]) original findings that many apparently normal horses have changes in the histological structure of intrinsic laryngeal muscles, such as would be expected from a progressive, unilateral denervation atrophy. In this study, equine larynges have been collected and examined to determine the presence of contralateral weight differences in those muscles.