Abcess in foot... keeps coming back!

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Bosrebel

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Does anyone else have a horse who keep having a foot abcess?! She's pretty much been off work since february, just as she seems to go sound and i think about riding again, it comes back. I trust my remedial farrier 200%, and its just as frustrating for him.

Anyone else experience this?
 
Is she given antibiotics at all for it?

Just that there are some articles which say that giving antibiotics can be counter productive as they cause the abscess to dry up before it has flushed out alll the nasties (simplisticly.)

Some people also prefer them to blow at the coronary band rather than digging them out, encouraging it to blow with tubbing and poulticing. They do seem to heal much more quickly when this happens.

I hope you get it sorted, good luck!
 
If the absess keeps coming back you really need to get you vet or farrier to search the foot out. Any puss you are getting out of the foot is probably tracking from the main site.
I have a poor old horse who has just come to me who has had this problem, the whole of the foot has been 'under-run' and now he has a different vet it looks awful but is getting better but he has lost the sole.We are still 'tubbing' the foot in Epsom salts, to keep the foot soft so we can keep the 'path' open for the infection to escape. He is then polticed, and on box rest being hand walked 2x's a day.
My vet never gives anti-biotics for foot absesses as they tend to shrink back the infection but not get rid of it totally .It will then come back as soon as the anti-biotics have been stoppped. As for knowing your horse has an infection and waiting for it to errupt is not such a good idea as it can underun the sole and they dont always take the most obvious route, fine if it happens but having had an infection under my finger nail and the pain of it for the smallest infection i would never do this to any horse in my care as the pain must be horrendous.
I hope you can get your horse sorted soon.
 
Repetitive abcessing in the foot is a likely sign of infection in the pedal bone. The only way to confirm this is by x-ray. If the pedal bone is infected it can be treated via an agressive course of antibiotics, or via a pedal bone scrape (surgical procedure).
 
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The pain must be horrendous.

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This is so true. I read a case report from an A & E consultant detailing the treatment of a woman who had been brought in with severe laceration injuries from a car accident. When she was asked where it hurt the most she whispered 'My Hand'. When they looked at her hand they found a haematoma under a fingernail. The pain from this was so bad her other injuries were hardly registering with her.
 
[ QUOTE ]
Repetitive abcessing in the foot is a likely sign of infection in the pedal bone. The only way to confirm this is by x-ray. If the pedal bone is infected it can be treated via an agressive course of antibiotics, or via a pedal bone scrape (surgical procedure).

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PF had an abcess that wouldn't go away and x-rays revealed it had got into her pedal bone. She had it scraped at Rossdales and they gave me some amazing x-rays of the hole in her foot and bit of bone missing
smile.gif
Anyhoo, it was very stressful as just about the time she was due to fly out here. The put a circular shoe with a plate on her foot and I had to plug the hole with iodine-soaked gauze twice a day. I was able to turn her out after protecting shoe and bolts with a 'boot' made of duct tape and she recovered very well.
 
Update: Arrived to see her this morning and she is walking much better, called farrier and he arrived, and the abscess has burst out through her heel, he said it looks as though its travelled from one side of her foot to the other, so now we can finally pinpoint where it is and so all poulticed up now, there is a light at the end of the tunnel!
 
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