Acute instability of the nuchal ligament following cervical neuromuscular dysfunction in a dressage horse Acute instabiliteit van het ligamentum nuchae ten gevolge van cervicale neuromusculaire disfunctie bij een dressuurpaard

The vertebrate nuchal ligament is a large elastic structure in the dorsal cervical midline between the occiput, the cervical vertebrae and the cranial thoracic spinous processes, which helps to support the head and neck of the horse (Gellman and Bertram, 2002a). The nuchal ligament consists of funicular (cord-like) and lamellar (sheet-like) parts (Dyson, 2003; Gellman and Bertram, 2002a). The funicular part is broad and flat at its origin on the cranial thoracic spines, and becomes more cord-like and narrow towards its insertion on the skull. The fibre bundles of the lamellar part are closely interwoven with those of the funicular part, with the lamellar bands coursing cranioventrally to insert on the dorsal spines of cervical vertebrae two through six (Gellman and Bertram, 2002a). The lamellar part separates the bilateral muscle groups of the Acute instability of the nuchal ligament following cervical neuromuscular dysfunction in a dressage horse