allergy - inhaler for my horse!

[hannah87]

hi, after bringing my mare back down to uni this term with me, she developed a nasty cough. to cut a long story short of endoscopys etc the vet has diagnosed her with a mild allergy. We think its most likely the rape seed that is farmed alot round here, as there is hardly any at home. We tried her on ventripulmin but she reacted to it badly. The vet now wants to try her on an inhaler.. i have absolutely no idea what to expect or what this entails! Anyone have any experiences with this?
We think she will only be affected with this allergy during the summer term, when she is down at uni with me, and therefore should only need the inhaler for the next month or so. I have owned her for 8 years and shes never showed any signs of COPD before so we are hoping when she comes home up north with me she will be ok again (fingers crossed).
Any thoughts appreciated!

 

[sallypops]

abby has been given an inhaler!! cause of her dust allergy, but i couldn't get her to take it she went mental literally crazy!! so i managed to get a couple of puffs in but now she's out 24/7 she doesn't need it anymore.

i think the small amount i got up her nose did help tho cause her allergy cleared up with that and anti biotics

 

[cyrilsmum]

I used an inhaler a few years ago on my horse, basically you put the mask over one nostril and hand over the other one and they breathe in the inhaler just like asthmatics. My horse took a bit of training but once he got the hang of it he was brilliant and could even reglate the doses he needed. To train him (he didn't like the woosh of the inhaler dose going into the mask) I cut up loads of small pieces of carrot and he got one for letting the mask touch him, then one for the mask over his nostril, then one after the 'woosh' and then one for each dose he took. He was on 15 doses to start with so it was a good way of keeping count of no. of doses, I lined up 15 pieces of carrot. He was on two different inhalers, a blue and a brown one, couldn't get him to have the blue one but he loved the brown one! Good luck, it seems impossible to start with but once you get the hang of it and they realise it helps its easy.