Overground Endoscopy Findings Following Laryngeal Tie-Forward for Management of DDSP

Introduction:
Laryngeal tie forward (LTF) for the treatment of dorsal displacement of the soft palate (DDSP) was first described over 15 years ago1. This has been followed by studies detailing its effectiveness in the racehorse, based on comparisons of pre- and post-operative racing performance2-4. The optimum indicator of the success of a surgical intervention is the elimination of the original problem. We report the effectiveness of LTF in a population of racing Thoroughbreds that underwent post-operative exercising overground endoscopic examination.

Materials and Methods:
Horses undergoing LTF following definitive diagnosis of palatal dysfunction by exercising endoscopic examination were included in the study. LTF was performed in each case, and in some cases thermocautery of the palate was also performed at the same time. In horses whereby medial deviation of the aryepiglottic folds (MDAF) was diagnosed pre-operatively, the aryepiglottic folds were resected. The horses underwent post-operative exercising endoscopy, using an examination protocol as close as possible to the pre-operative examination, validated via monitoring with GPS equipment. In addition to the determination of palatal dysfunction, any other upper airway abnormalities were recorded.

Associations between binary categorical variables (presentation for poor performance Y/N or presentation for noise Y/N, with evidence of post-surgical DDSP Y/N or post-surgical PI Y/N) were tested using Fisher’s exact approximation of Chi-squared and statistical significance was set at P<0.05.  [...]