Fascia- the biggest sensory organ in the body

Fascia often doesn't get spoken about much but it impacts your animals movement massively, therefore, more awareness needs to be made regarding the importance of maintaining fascia health.

The best way to describe fascia is that it is a 3D web like system that covers the entire body. It functions as a shock absorber, tension sensor and storage for water which enable it to support soft tissue structures including muscles, tendons and ligaments allowing for slide and glide of these tissues relative to eachother in order to prevent friction.

Fascia consists of collagen and elastin, collagen provides resistance to tension and stretch which affects posture and elastin allows for extensibility providing fascia with a good amount of movement. Fascia restrictions can occur due to a multitude of reasons but Gillian Higgins from 'horses inside out' provides a good comparison... imagine how it feel to have a small piece of gravel inside your show... that is how a fascial restriction feels to your animals.

Superficial fascia: This is the layer which is situated closest to the skin and separates muscle from the skin.

Deep fascia: This lies furthest from the skin and surrounds skeletal muscle.

Visceral fascia: This encases organs which helps to protect them.

Neural fascia: Covers peripheral nerves which are situated outside the brain and spinal cord.

For fascia to function correctly, it needs to be able to slide and glide over structures within the body. This allows your animal to have a good range of motion with minimal restriction which is important in injury prevention, energy conservation and the co-ordination of movement. A liquid substance known as hyaluronan helps to facilitate movement of fascia, however, overtime due to a lack of hyaluronan fascia can experience tension and dehydration which leads to the formulation of restrictions as a result of solidification of liquid crystaline matrix within each fascia tubule.