THE HORSE L I S T E N E R
In cracking good form Rob Jackson, The Horseback Vet, is sought after around the world. CANDIDA BAKER finds out why.
Y
ou have to get up early to catch Rob Jackson. This UKbased veterinarian specialises
in horses’ skeletal systems, and his action-packed days start from 6.00am. Fortunately for me his first port of call on his last Australian visit was with a client who lives not far away from me. Renowned for his assessment of problems in horses, his chiropractic-style treatment, and his personable, calm manner, Rob (BVetMed, DipSurv (RP), MRCVS), comes out to Australia two or three times a year to treat the clients who have been lucky enough to find out about his work. And this is why I’m here, because his client, Anne McDiarmid was so thrilled with the treatment Rob gave her massive Warmblood George, that she now organizes his visit to Australia and she thought I would like to see his work. Anne’s story started several years ago
Rob Jackson and George. “I feel better now”.
when George suffered a soft tissue injury. “He’d been through two rehab
becoming more and more aware of how
courage in her hands and tentatively
programs over 18 months, but he still
skeletal injury can lead to soft tissue
messaged Rob.
had a strange gait behind, and he was
problems and vice versa – and who
swinging his hind leg through in an odd
knows which one leads to which one!
way. Both myself and my coach felt there
In the year I’d been following the group
was something not quite right higher up
one name kept coming up as someone
in the sacroiliac or in his back, but we
who could solve issues where others
couldn’t pinpoint it, and neither could
had failed, and that was Rob, ‘The
By the next night she had an answer.
anybody else.”
Horseback Vet’.”
George was locked in his lumbar region.
In the meantime, Anne, in the search for
Any of us – myself included – who
“I was so relieved I had a diagnosis that
answers, had been following a UK-based
have been through the roller coaster of
fitted with what I was feeling that I asked
FB group that focussed on soft tissue
rehabilitating horses from injuries know
Rob if he knew of anyone in Australia
injury. “There was a lot of discussion
the days and nights of desperation,
who could fix the issue,” she says. “Rob
in the group of the chicken and egg
and it was in the middle of one of those
told me that unfortunately he didn’t
syndrome,” she says. “Everybody is
sleepless nights that Anne took her
know anyone who had perfected his
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“I couldn’t believe that all the way from the UK, I not only got an immediate reply but a request to send video of some very specific movements,” she says.
