Impingement of dorsal spinous processes (kissing spines) is a common source of chronic back pain in horses that is frequently underdiagnosed and undertreated, causing significant welfare harm.
Kissing spines cause chronic back pain that profoundly affects a horse's working life and quality of life. Horses with undiagnosed kissing spines endure pain with every saddle-related interaction and during ridden work. The subtlety of clinical signs means many horses are labelled "difficult" or "unwilling" when they are actually in pain. Punitive training approaches applied to pain-related behaviour cause additional welfare harm. Correct diagnosis and targeted treatment — combined with physiotherapy and saddle fit assessment — allows many horses with kissing spines to return to comfortable work. The welfare obligation is to investigate back pain systematically rather than attributing changes in behaviour to training problems without ruling out physical causes.