This module will be available no later than November 15, 2026. You will receive an email when the module is available.

Effective anesthesia is inseparable from adequate pain management. This module provides a clinically relevant and structured framework for understanding equine pain, recognizing its different presentations, and selecting appropriate treatment strategies in both perioperative and non-surgical settings. Particular attention is given to multimodal analgesia, repeated reassessment, and adapting treatment to the individual horse and clinical situation.

Topics include:

• Basic principles of pain physiology – nociception, peripheral and central sensitization, and the mechanisms involved in the development and persistence of pain.
• Recognition of acute versus chronic pain – identifying behavioural, physiological, and functional indicators of pain and understanding how pain presentation may differ between acute and long-standing conditions.
• Pain assessment in horses – practical use of clinical observation and validated pain-scoring systems to support more objective assessment and follow-up.
• Pharmacological treatment options – appropriate use of NSAIDs, opioids, alpha-2 agonists, local anesthetics, ketamine, and other adjunctive analgesic drugs.
• Multimodal analgesia – combining drugs and techniques with different mechanisms of action to improve pain control while limiting adverse effects.
• Local and regional analgesic techniques – integrating nerve blocks, local infiltration, and regional anesthesia into perioperative and procedural pain management.
• Role of non-pharmacological interventions – environmental management, positioning, rest, physical support, cooling or other supportive measures where appropriate.
• Perioperative pain management – planning analgesia before, during, and after surgery rather than treating pain only once clinical signs become apparent.
• Reassessment and treatment adjustment – evaluating response to therapy and recognizing when analgesic strategies need to be intensified, modified, or reconsidered.
• Case-based examples – applying pain assessment and treatment principles to common clinical scenarios, including postoperative pain, musculoskeletal pain, abdominal pain, and other painful conditions.

General information:

• Teacher: Charlotte Cuypers
• Duration: min 2 hours