Abscess woes continue. :(

[Meowy Catkin]

At what point do you say 's*d it, I want an x-ray!' ?

Short version.
Abscess takes weeks to finally show. Farrier takes shoe off and exposes it, it's coming out of two points (nail hole and small hole that he cuts in the sole), the abscess is poultced. Once there's no more black gunk for 3 days, shoe put back on and sound mare turned out. After 48 hrs, mare looking slightly 'footy'. After another 24 hrs she is lame on a circle.

 

[brucea]

Abscesses can have a number of tracks and it can take time for all of them to clear.

Maybe worth getting vet to have a look. It may just have sealed over before it fully drained and there is pressure building up again.

 

[misst]

I am no expert at all but our youngster has just got over one. He was footy, then lame - vet came no abscess found. More lame - tender area found and dug - no pus. Poulticed for a few days and pus came out through frog! After 3 days no more pus so dry poultice then nothing - then lame again! Another vet visit and more poulticing and a dig by farrier at the toe - more pus out of the frog Poultice for another 3 days then dry poulticed for few more. We then did daytime turnout but in a hoofboot which was brilliant. We brought him in at night as he probably would not have kept a boot on for 24 hours.
Touch wood he is now sound and no more sign of the abscess but it has only just come right and he started footiness at Christmas time.

Our vet was going to xray if we had no pus the second time but then once we got more pus we decided to wait and see. Hopefully he is now better.
I was told that these things can take weeks to come out and there may be more than one site. It was hard work doing a 2yo 16hh lad who did not want his poorly foot touched and had never been stabled before so I know how you feel. Good luck.

 

[illy89]

My foal has had 3 abcesses over the winter The last one was really bad and we had to get the vet to dig a channel and she was on antibiotics for a week. I would possibly get the vet out if it doesn't seem to get better with just poulticing.

 

[Meowy Catkin]

Thanks for the replies. She's seen the vet once (although two vets came and had a good old look because one was giving the second a lift to the garage across the road where her car was being mended) and the farrier has been three times. I have spoken to the farrier again today and he wants me to see how she is tomorrow. I just have this bad feeling that it's not over yet.

 

[threeponies]

My gelding had an abscess that stopped producing pus on the poultice but he was still crippled. Eventually he was x-rayed and found to have an infection in his lateral cartiledge from the abscess, needed surgery and I was told if he was paddock sound I would be doing well. He is absolutely fine now but similar thing happened to an acquaintance, she did not get x-rays done and her horse was pts, as abscess/lameness could not be sorted. This is obviously a worse case scenario, but I do feel if I hadn't had my boy x-rayed he wouldn't be with me today.