Industry POV | Clinical Documentation
The pre-purchase exam is one of the most scrutinized records in equine practice. It gets read by the buyer's vet, the insurer, the lender, and in a disputed sale, by lawyers. The clinical judgment is yours. The record is what everyone else relies on after you've driven to the next call.
StableTrack is a cloud-native equine practice management platform with a live Pre-Purchase Exam template: a structured, AAEP-aligned clinical form that replaces the free-text SOAP and the paper sheet you re-type later.
Key Takeaways
- A defensible PPE record needs structured data, not narrative: AAEP lameness grade per limb (0 to 5), flexion results per limb, Henneke Body Condition Score (1 to 9), a full systems exam, and a clear "suitable for intended use" call.
- The record is the deliverable. The buyer's vet, the insurer, and legal counsel may each review it separately from your clinical judgment.
- StableTrack ships a live PPE template with 39 structured fields, so every exam captures the same components in the same format, no building structure from scratch on a Saturday sale.
- With offline mode, you can complete the structured record in the barn or the sale yard with no signal and let it sync when you're back online.
- Imaging file-drop, AI extraction from uploaded reports, and one-click certificate generation are in active development, not live yet. We'd rather tell you that than let you find out at the yard.
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Why the PPE Became a Legal Document
A decade ago a PPE was a few handwritten lines and a conversation. That era is gone. Today's exam is a formal risk assessment, and the record you produce becomes the reference document the buyer's side relies on long after the exam.
If your documentation doesn't capture the full picture, the gap between what you found and what you wrote becomes your exposure. That is why the software matters. A note tool that lets a whole system go unrecorded is a liability. A structured record that makes completeness obvious is protection.
What a Complete PPE Record Has to Contain
A complete record carries structured fields for lameness grading, flexion results, body condition, a systems exam, and a clear assessment. The AAEP publishes guidelines for pre-purchase examinations that set the clinical standard most practitioners work to, and most reviewing vets and bloodstock insurers use those guidelines as their benchmark.
Lameness grades. Findings recorded on the AAEP 0 to 5 scale, with the limb, the gait, and the surface. "Mild left front" leaves room for argument. "Grade 2/5 left forelimb, trot, hard surface" does not.
Flexion results. Limb, joint, and response, not a general impression. "Flexions unremarkable" doesn't meet the standard. A per-limb record does.
Body condition. A numeric Henneke score (1 to 9), not a narrative estimate. The number is what insurers expect to see and what can be compared across examiners and across time.
Systems exam. Ophthalmic, cardiac, respiratory, gastrointestinal, musculoskeletal, neurologic. A free-text note can quietly omit an entire system and still look finished. A structured form can't.
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What the StableTrack PPE Template Actually Includes (Live Today)
The PPE template ships as a system default and auto-suggests when the appointment type contains "PPE" or "pre-purchase." It is a structured clinical form, not a blank SOAP with a label. The fields map to the components a complete exam requires:
- Subjective: prospective buyer details, intended use (pleasure, show jumping, dressage, racing, breeding, trail, other), purchase price range, known history, and insurance requirements captured as structured fields.
- Signalment: breed, age, sex, microchip and registry details.
- Body Condition Score: Henneke 1 to 9 with a visual reference.
- Conformation: structured by region, head and neck, topline, limbs, hooves.
- Cardiac: rate, rhythm, and murmur grade on the 0 to 6 Reef scale.
- Lameness: AAEP grade per limb, at walk and trot.
- Flexion: per-limb results with grade.
- Hoof testers, hoof balance, neurologic (ataxia) scoring.
- Assessment: a prominent "suitable for intended use" field (yes / no / with reservations), significant findings, risk factors, limitations of examination, and prognosis for intended use.
- Plan: a radiograph views checklist (front feet lateral and DP, hocks, stifles, cervical spine, back, other), additional diagnostics checklist, per-view radiograph findings, recommendations to the buyer, and a record of whether a certificate was issued.
None of that asks you to build structure from scratch. The template carries the same AAEP-aligned shape into every exam, which is the whole point. The record your associate produces on a Saturday sale looks like the record you produce on a Tuesday farm call.
Built for the Field, Including When There's No Signal
PPEs happen at sale yards and on private farms where the bars on your phone are a rumor. StableTrack runs in the browser on any device, and with offline mode you can install it as an app and keep working with no connection: browse patients and the calendar, and create clinical records and SOAP drafts in the field. Everything syncs automatically when you're back online.
For imaging, the practice's radiographs live in the Keystone imaging and radiology workflow through the shipped Asteris integration, and the PPE template records which views you captured and your findings per view, so the imaging is accounted for inside the structured record.
Why Structured Beats Free Text for a PPE
Free-text notes are fine for plenty of clinical situations. The PPE is not one of them, because it gets read by people with competing interests.
- Reviewability. A second vet reading "AAEP Grade 2/5 left forelimb, trot, hard surface" knows exactly what you found.
- Completeness. A structured template makes a missing field obvious. A narrative can skip cardiac entirely and still look done.
- Consistency. Every PPE follows the same format, so the buyer's vet and the insurer know what to expect.
- Defensibility. If a sale is disputed, a structured record with timestamped entries holds up better than findings buried in paragraphs.
| Documentation approach | What gets missed | Risk |
|---|---|---|
| Paper form, scanned later | Incomplete fields, no audit trail | High |
| Generic SOAP in a small-animal PMS | No AAEP grade fields, no equine structure | High |
| Word template | Free text only, no structured data | Medium-High |
| Equine PMS with no PPE template | Structure rebuilt from scratch each time | Medium |
| StableTrack PPE template | Consistent AAEP-aligned fields, audit trail preserved | Low |
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What's Coming
We're straight about what's live and what isn't, because equine vets can spot a marketer at fifty paces. In active development for the PPE workflow:
- Document and imaging file-drop inside the SOAP note, with AI extraction that reads an uploaded lab or referral PDF and proposes field values for you to accept, edit, or reject. The AI never saves anything on its own.
- One-click PPE certificate generation from the completed record, on clinic letterhead, with the record as the single source so the certificate and the clinical note can't drift apart.
When those ship, you'll hear it from us. Until then, the template above is what you can use today.
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FAQ
What should equine pre-purchase exam software include? Structured fields for AAEP lameness grading (0 to 5), per-limb flexion results, Henneke Body Condition Score (1 to 9), and a full systems exam (ophthalmic, cardiac, respiratory, musculoskeletal, neurologic), plus a clear assessment of suitability for intended use. It should also work in the field, where connectivity is unreliable. Free-text SOAP notes are inadequate for a document that may be reviewed by a second vet, an insurer, or legal counsel.
Does StableTrack work without a signal at the sale yard? Yes. With offline mode you can install StableTrack as an app and keep working with no connection, browsing patients and the calendar and creating clinical records and SOAP drafts in the field. Your work syncs automatically when the connection returns.
How does StableTrack handle imaging for a PPE today? The PPE template includes a radiograph views checklist and per-view findings fields, so the imaging you captured is documented inside the structured record. The practice's radiographs live in the Keystone imaging and radiology workflow through the Asteris integration. Direct file-drop of images into the SOAP note is on the roadmap.
Does StableTrack generate a PPE certificate automatically? Not yet. Today the template produces a complete, consistent structured record, including a field to record that a certificate was issued, that serves as the single source for your certificate. One-click certificate generation from that record is in development.
What is the AAEP standard for PPE documentation? The AAEP publishes guidelines for pre-purchase examinations covering lameness evaluation on the 0 to 5 grading scale, flexion testing with documented responses, systems examination, and disclosure of findings to the buyer. These guidelines are the benchmark most reviewing vets and bloodstock insurers use when evaluating a PPE record.
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Book a Demo
If your current PPE documentation is a mix of paper forms, free-text SOAPs, and separately filed radiographs, the gap between what you find and what you record is a risk you carry every exam. See the StableTrack PPE template in a live walkthrough. Book a 20-minute walkthrough and see how a structured, AAEP-aligned PPE record gets built in the field.
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