anyone else ever had problems with colic after worming ? (equest pramox)

[barnaby bear]

thanks again folks for your thoughts and kind words xx

 

[Poppys Nannan]

Sending some hugs and strength.
I have just posted a query about equest promax and footiness before i saw your post, it is really making me worry about the best cause of action.
It is only a small thought but thank you for sharing as it may help others (such as me) make informed decisions about treatments.x

So sorry for your loss, please take care x

 

[mr fields]

yes i experienced the exact same as you from the same wormer i had just bought the horse the day i wormed it it had an all its tongue swelled nd started dribbling nd thn started collicing, it is an allergic reaction to the wormer all the horses tht come onto my yard has to be wormed as im a dealing yard so have horses coming nd goin every week nd wouldnt be fair if liveries caught something off 1 of my horses, i have never experienced anything like this until a couple of month ago. my greatest appologisies for your loss

 

[FairyLights]

I dont use ivermctin [ correlation with grass sickness] or moxidectin based wormers any more. I use Panacur [ no worm resistance checked with worm counts] and pyratel embonate based wormers.

 

[FairyLights]

So sorry for your loss. Big hugs. When pramox first came out our yard used it, 3 went down with colic, one of them my old Arab. Thankfully all was well, but one pony struggled for 24hours. Ive never used the stuff since. I dont use Equest either. I egg count year round, equitape spring and autumn and 5 day course too. Touch wood, no probs. I think (and this is MY opinion) that the drugs are getting too strong for horses to deal with. Wormers these days last 10-12 weeks and although this will involve a release mechanism of the drug, I think the strength is over powering the horses system. I never remember colic with good old strongrid all those years ago.

I agree.

 

[Tnavas]

So sad to hear of your loss a tragic end. (((HUGS)))

Yes a friend recently wormed hers with a moxidectin based wormer and had her horse collicky for several days.

Fortunately hers did recover. Once when I wormed the school horses for tapeworm - I don't remember the make - I had many of them go down rolling for a period of about 30 mins - very scarey as when the first went down I had already wormed 20 of them. I phoned the vet who advised that it is sometimes a side effect of the wormer.

I wormed my filly yesterday and she was a little strange for a while after, hers was an ivermectin/praziquantal wormer. She rubbed her muzzle lots on the ground and on her legs - then rolled a couple of times. I stayed around for a good hour and she was fine. Greeted me with a wheres my dinner whinny in the evening.

 

[barnaby bear]

thanks again for your replies and hugs and thoughts folks....much appreciated. xx

interesting that it seems many horses had a reaction soon after the wormer....

whereas my oliver was fine for 48hrs and then went colicky ......

perhaps his colic wasnt linked to the wormer and just a coincidence ????

as he was fine for 2 days after the wormer......there were no problems straight away.

cant believe its a week today ......bless him.


thanks once again folks ....it is very touching and comforting that you guys are giving me hugs and stuff ....and i really do thank you from the bottom of my heart xx

 

[skint1]

OP I am very sorry for the loss of your horse, you must be devastated.

Our horse had a mild (ish) colic episode last week, once on Tuesday and then again on Saturday. On Saturday the vet suggested it might be caused by worm burden and we're giving him a 5 day wormer followed by a tapeworm wormer, I'm really worried now.

 

[barnaby bear]

owww....sorry if i have made you concerned.

if it helps any, i just had another conversation with my vet who treated oliver and who also prescribed the wormer in the first place and she said that they use that wormer all the time in their practise and i dont think they would continue to use it if horse after horse was going down with colic all the time after it .

she said it could have been a tumour with oliver ??? or sheer coincidence with the wormer???

hope i havent worried you too much - sorry

 

[alsiola]

Continual use of wormers as prescribed by the manufacturers leads to resistance problems my.

Agreed, which is why I would never say to do this either. If your horse's need worming then worm them with the proper dose, if they don't need worming then don't worm them. Otherwise 20 years from now we will have no effective wormers left when we do need them.

 

[Changes]

OP, I have a horse who colics after worming for tapeworm. It is the only time he has ever colicked in his life (I bought him from his breeder so I know this).
He has done it badly three times now.

I did a load of research into the whys and wherefores, but ultimately it seems he just has a reaction to the drug. I've had him 15 years, and had a few other horses through my hands wormed exactly the same as him at the same time on the same grazing (at the time), and they've all been fine.

I had blood tests done which showed nothing, and he's been regularly wormed all his life.

The common factors to the colic were being wormed in the autumn, and a tapeworm wormer. However, he has never reacted to the tapeworm wormer in the spring, nor has it been a particular brand that set him off.

I always used to worm when they came in at night, and the colic had appeared overnight. So I wondered if it was because the grass is disappearing at this time of year, and there is less food in his system to spread the impact of the drug on the gut lining. That might also explain why some years he's better or worse. He's always been in work and fit when he's done it as well.

I may of course be barking up the wrong tree totally, but working on that premise, for the last 5 years I've wormed in the morning, AFTER a huge feed (bigger than normal, bulked up with sugar beet and chaff) and haylage, and then turned out, and touch wood no problems, or any indication of them.

Don't feel guilty, horses need worming, it was maybe just his time.

Although my horse has colicked due to worming, it didn't cost him his life, so there must have been other factors at play with your boy.

I'm so sorry for your loss.

 

[skint1]

owww....sorry if i have made you concerned.

if it helps any, i just had another conversation with my vet who treated oliver and who also prescribed the wormer in the first place and she said that they use that wormer all the time in their practise and i dont think they would continue to use it if horse after horse was going down with colic all the time after it .

she said it could have been a tumour with oliver ??? or sheer coincidence with the wormer???

hope i havent worried you too much - sorry

Oh no, don't worry, I was worried anyway, I am just a worrier We have been so lucky that he only had 2 relatively mild episodes and we don't know why it happened which also really worries me. We've only had him a couple of months, he was worm counted soon after arriving and was clear, he's had a treatment of Panacur Guard for encysted worms now (vet thinks this could be a possible cause of colic episodes) and so far been fine and we'd have to do a tapeworm treatment anyway soon, yard policy.

I'm so sorry you lost your Oliver, it is an incredibly difficult thing to go through

 

[paddy555]

Agreed, which is why I would never say to do this either. If your horse's need worming then worm them with the proper dose, if they don't need worming then don't worm them. Otherwise 20 years from now we will have no effective wormers left when we do need them.

can you explain what you do about encysted please? do you worm with equest annually as worm counts won't show encysted.
thanks

 

[foxy1]

A friend's pony had colic soon after worming (approx 6-8 hours), vet told her the colic was due to worming and the wormer had done it's job.

Sorry about your horse. It must have been such a shock.

 

[JanetGeorge]

A friend's pony had colic soon after worming (approx 6-8 hours), vet told her the colic was due to worming and the wormer had done it's job.

Sadly - this is often the case. Equest Pramox is a very powerful wormer - AND it is stored in body fat. IF a horse is low on body fat, it can have side effects. And if a horse has a reasonable burden - particularly encysted - it shifts them SO quickly it can cause blockages - or a 'toxic' effect.

This is why - if a horse is in poor condition - or hasn't been wormed regularly (even if egg counting has been done) - or if its worming status is not known then Equest (whether Pramox or ordinary) is not a suitable wormer.

I've just had a mare come in (Ruby Treasure) as a rescue in very poor condition - we gave her Panacur 5 day which is effective - but mild! Some interesting creepy-crawlies in her dung for several days - but no ill effects at all.

I should add that I've used Equest and Equest Pramox on literally dozens of horses - many times - including foals (over 12 weeks) and brood mares - with NO ill effects - and I believe it to be a 'safe' wormer if used in accordance with the above.

Unfortunately, co-incidences happen with horses and the OP should NOT beat herself up for worming Oliver with Equest. Chances are it was purely and simply a co-incidence that he got colic so close after worming. (And I would expect a colic DUE to worming to show up in less than 24 hours!)

 

[sugar mouse]

I found this thread today while looking for info on post worming haemorrhaging as I lost a beloved home bred mare today and am still trying to work through making sense of what happened.
My mare was wormed with Pramox almost three weeks ago and at the time I had concerns regarding colic reactions. I wormed four of my stock on a Monday morning just in case I needed to call out a vet but all seemed well, I heaved a sigh of relief and thought no more about it.
This morning I found my eighteen year old mare down in her box with extremely elevated heart and breathing rates, clearly in a lot of pain. Nothing administered by the vet seemed to ease her and by early afternoon her circulation was shutting down and I had her put to sleep.
Anyone reading this will understand the shock of suddenly losing an apparently healthy mare who never had a sorry day in her life and who had been her usual cheeky self just a few hours before. All the haylage I gave her at midnight had been eaten, so when did this change happen and more importantly, why? Why now, why her, why me?
All afternoon I have been worrying about what I did that caused this to happen, hence my interest in Pramox and possible reactions. My rational brain tells me this had nothing to do with M's demise and it is all coincidence. More likely it was a ruptured tumour as she had melanomas and I lost her mother to the same fate almost exactly ten years ago.
I joined this forum to post tonight having read through the entire thread started by Barnaby Bear. It has helped make me realise (again) that life is not always rational and ordered as we would wish and seemingly illogical, self blaming ideas are actually the early stages of the grieving process. My vet tells me that statistically September is a dreaded month for the number of horse deaths and this year, unfortunately, we are part of that.
To Barnaby Bear, I share your pain at the loss of an old friend and wish you well. My apologies to everyone else for rambling (displacement activity) but also I am now thinking of throwing away the other five Pramox not yet administered and returning to tried and tested Panacur five day treatment for my other equines.

 

[barnaby bear]

Sadly - this is often the case. Equest Pramox is a very powerful wormer - AND it is stored in body fat. IF a horse is low on body fat, it can have side effects. And if a horse has a reasonable burden - particularly encysted - it shifts them SO quickly it can cause blockages - or a 'toxic' effect.

This is why - if a horse is in poor condition - or hasn't been wormed regularly (even if egg counting has been done) - or if its worming status is not known then Equest (whether Pramox or ordinary) is not a suitable wormer.

I've just had a mare come in (Ruby Treasure) as a rescue in very poor condition - we gave her Panacur 5 day which is effective - but mild! Some interesting creepy-crawlies in her dung for several days - but no ill effects at all.

I should add that I've used Equest and Equest Pramox on literally dozens of horses - many times - including foals (over 12 weeks) and brood mares - with NO ill effects - and I believe it to be a 'safe' wormer if used in accordance with the above.

Unfortunately, co-incidences happen with horses and the OP should NOT beat herself up for worming Oliver with Equest. Chances are it was purely and simply a co-incidence that he got colic so close after worming. (And I would expect a colic DUE to worming to show up in less than 24 hours!)

yer.... you would think that colic would show up within the first 24 hrs of worming wouldnt you..... i guess.
maybe it was just a co incidence like you say, think i said before the real irony is i bought the wormer from the vets and said a couple of times to them ''are you sure this wormer is ok for him cause he is 24''..... they insisted it was. so i took the wormer.
oliver was extremely well and had a really good body weight on him - a little porker the truth be known - bless him- and though he is a pure bred arab - he was a stocky kind and having had him over 20 years i knew his worming history etc .
i used to give him panacure 5 day wormer but he wouldnt touch it cause he knew there was a wormer in it .....so thats why i gave him the wormer that i did.

ahhh.....i'm just waffeling on now cause its late ....sorry if this post makes no sense- over tired.
thank you again for your thoughts and interesting posts folks - i will re read them in the morning

 

[barnaby bear]

I found this thread today while looking for info on post worming haemorrhaging as I lost a beloved home bred mare today and am still trying to work through making sense of what happened.
My mare was wormed with Pramox almost three weeks ago and at the time I had concerns regarding colic reactions. I wormed four of my stock on a Monday morning just in case I needed to call out a vet but all seemed well, I heaved a sigh of relief and thought no more about it.
This morning I found my eighteen year old mare down in her box with extremely elevated heart and breathing rates, clearly in a lot of pain. Nothing administered by the vet seemed to ease her and by early afternoon her circulation was shutting down and I had her put to sleep.
Anyone reading this will understand the shock of suddenly losing an apparently healthy mare who never had a sorry day in her life and who had been her usual cheeky self just a few hours before. All the haylage I gave her at midnight had been eaten, so when did this change happen and more importantly, why? Why now, why her, why me?
All afternoon I have been worrying about what I did that caused this to happen, hence my interest in Pramox and possible reactions. My rational brain tells me this had nothing to do with M's demise and it is all coincidence. More likely it was a ruptured tumour as she had melanomas and I lost her mother to the same fate almost exactly ten years ago.
I joined this forum to post tonight having read through the entire thread started by Barnaby Bear. It has helped make me realise (again) that life is not always rational and ordered as we would wish and seemingly illogical, self blaming ideas are actually the early stages of the grieving process. My vet tells me that statistically September is a dreaded month for the number of horse deaths and this year, unfortunately, we are part of that.
To Barnaby Bear, I share your pain at the loss of an old friend and wish you well. My apologies to everyone else for rambling (displacement activity) but also I am now thinking of throwing away the other five Pramox not yet administered and returning to tried and tested Panacur five day treatment for my other equines.

owwww mate......i really dont know what to say ......

i am utterly gutted for you - i really am ......i'm so sorry .

i think your right.....about blaming ideas being part of the grieving process....

but its so hard to not blame ourselves isnt it. but you know what mate - i know we are not to blame. we just do our best dont we and thats all we can ever do.

small consolation i know....but for what its worth i will keep you in my thoughts ....i promise. ((((hug))))

 

[paddy555]

Barnaby Bear and Sugar mouse, I cannot begin to tell you how sorry I am. You must both be devastated. Thanks for starting this thread. It has really made me think about a wormer I have never really felt happy about.

Last year I wormed by 25yo arab (difficult to keep weight on) and 16yo grey with a large melanoma problem with equest for the first time. The grey was OK but after an hour the arab had colic for the first time in 25 years. Fortunately he was OK. The vet didn't seem in the slightest suprised when I rang to say my horse had colic after using equest. He had been regularly wormed or worm counted and indeed had had eqvalan duo only 10 weeks earlier. I don't see how I could have known if he had a high encysted burden and certainly along the lines of JanetGeorge I would never give equest to a horse where I didn't know it's worming history. I would never give pramox to anything.

I am now thinking seriously about what to do come encysted time. Perhaps PG is not such a bad choice. (it can always be syringed down if they won't eat it)
my condolonces to both of you.

 

[sugar mouse]

Thanks for your kind thoughts, Barnaby Bear and Paddy555. It has helped to communicate through a forum as I haven't yet been able to tell any of my horse friends for fear of breaking down and blubbing at them. I do appreciate your support.
It concerned me a little when I read Janet George saying that Pramox is stored in the fat. Like Oliver, my mare was a little butterball and never looked her age. Now I'm thinking, was their condition related to their downfall with chemicals stored in their bodies and slowly being released? I never thought that might be how certain wormers could be long acting but it makes sense and I don't like the thought of it at all.

 

[barnaby bear]

Thanks for your kind thoughts, Barnaby Bear and Paddy555. It has helped to communicate through a forum as I haven't yet been able to tell any of my horse friends for fear of breaking down and blubbing at them. I do appreciate your support.
It concerned me a little when I read Janet George saying that Pramox is stored in the fat. Like Oliver, my mare was a little butterball and never looked her age. Now I'm thinking, was their condition related to their downfall with chemicals stored in their bodies and slowly being released? I never thought that might be how certain wormers could be long acting but it makes sense and I don't like the thought of it at all.

i think janet george meant that if the horse is low on body fat ....or 'poor condition' then the wormer is too strong ......
not our horses who were very well and a good weight.

my vet did say she uses the wormer all the time ....its really commonly used in her practise and if they were getting a lot of problems i'm sure they wouldnt use it .

hope your ok today sugar mouse...... it hurts so much doesnt it ....sending you strength xxx

 

[Dolcé]

So sorry for your loss, both to Barnaby Bear and Sugar Mouse. Pramox is not something I would use following the press it was given when it first came out. I haven't used Equest either since that time until I was recommended it for my in foal mare by the SQP. On worming the mare had 4 weeks left to her due date, the morning following worming the foal had arrived, very small and touch and go as to whether she would make it, coincidence? I don't think so, the mare was showing absolutely no signs of being ready and had no milk for the first few days or so. I will never use Equest in any form again. Make sure that you let your SQP, where you bought your wormers from, know what has happened. It might not be proven but they will then be aware of it and may consider their advice carefully before recommending it again. I know that mine will not be recommending it for in foal mares again, nor will the other local supplier as I warned them too.

 

[domane]

I would also like to add my condolences to Barnaby Bear and Sugar Mouse. I've just wormed my Clydesdale X with Pramox and he is footsore so I'm off to buy him some Global Herbs Restore later to try to re-balance his gut, poor lad. My ex-TB used to get footsore too (but he had typically flat TB feet unfortunately) and I think I used to put him on a course of pink powder before, during and after treatment. Stupid me, didn't think there might be a problem again... my youngster never seems to be affected.

I think when a horse has colic, it is natural to look for blame because "it was just one of those things" just doesn't cut it with us these days... with our access to information and the internet we are all a lot more informed than years ago and if a horse dies I think we almost get comforted by being able to give a definitive reason for why the tragedy occurred.

 

[pines of rome]

I used Pramox on my horse when I got him, no colic but interestingly his tiny sarcoid started to grow a lot shortly afterwards, could the wormer compromised his immune system?
Had a worm count done before next worming, came back zero so I have been using Ellen Collinsons herbal No Verms for the last 10 months, have sent a worm test today so will see what the results are.
My horse is currently being treated by a homeopathic vet for his sarcoid so I am hoping not to use a chemical wormer. Anyone else going the herbal route?

 

[barnaby bear]

thanks again for your thoughts and posts folks.
one wonders if i should have perhaps had a post mortem done....but i just couldnt bare to put him through anything else- he was too beautiful to do anything invasive to...and i couldnt stand anymore stress either.

i guess i will have to live with the uncertainty.

ironically i was thinking back to the horses and riding school i used to ride at as a child......the horses there were never ever ever wormed in their lives - and 99% of them were still alive well into their mid 30's

some of the original horses are still alive now and i'm 41 .

if i had a horse now...gospel honest truth , i would poo pick the field ....but i really dont know if i would ever worm again ?

my horse was in a field on his own anyway ....with horses in the field next to him.

like i said above the horses where i used to ride were never wormed and lived to a ripe old age.

is worming REALLY neccessary or is it a dangerous rip off by drug companies?

and the worm counts.....they cant detect some of the worms at certain stages anyway can they ?

so those too must be a little bit of a waste of time ????

 

[pines of rome]

I agree with you there wasn,t all this hype about wormers years ago and strangely enough there are reports of horses from the 17th to 19th centuries reaching remarkable ages and there were not any chemical wormers then so they must have used herbs, makes you question it all?
I hope you start to feel better soon, so sorry for you. x

 

[galacasinoking]

i will never use this wormer again. a friend had to have her welsh mare pts after giving her this as she got bad colic and was showing no signs of improvement, even after painkillers etc
and quite a few other people have mentioned colicy signs after using it. my cob didnt show complete signs of colic but was 'tucked up' and looked uncomfortable and was sluggish for days
keep away from it i say! it shouldnt be allowed on the market

 

[sugar mouse]

Thanks everyone for your kind thoughts and condolences - they do help.

Reading about others experiences with footiness after Pramox worming, which I have not heard of before, but strangely two of the other mares I wormed at the same time as M are now showing laminitic symptoms. Her pair bond was footery yesterday morning so I kept her in for the day and she is no better today. The other mare who was stabled next door to M came in from the field quite lame on her off fore last night and by this morning was showing laminitic symptoms in both front feet although one is still worse than the other. I was wondering if it could possibly have been down to stress as all my horses were very upset on Saturday morning and obviously recognised M's distress.

Before anyone suggests it is something in my fodder, all nine horses are on the same feeding and turnout regime which has not altered in recent weeks. Only those dosed with Pramox three weeks ago today are showing any signs of ailing. The fourth one wormed is a three year old filly and so far she seems fine (touch wood). As others have reported, the youngsters seem to be less affected.

I'm too frightened to worm the others now as I have another couple of mares and three young geldings to do. What is a natural wormer and where do you get them? None of mine have ever been regularly wormed with an assortment of chemical wormers which must sound terribly irresponsible to some. In defence I'll say I'm lucky to have my own land which had not previously been grazed by horses. In the twenty-eight years I have been here, only my own home bred horses have grazed the fields and I have never had a worm burden or for that matter a serious colic, fatal or otherwise. With all the dire warnings about not worming horses regularly and the dangers of encysted redworm, I thought perhaps I ought to dose them all before winter. Where is the time machine when you need it???

Like you Barnaby Bear, I couldn't bear the thought of my beautiful girl being cut open to confirm the precise cause, although I will always wonder if something could have been done. My equine vet is a friend and hugely competent so I trust her judgement. All evidence pointed to a tumour of some kind in the mesentery affecting the small intestine and even with immediate surgery, a favourable outcome would not have been guaranteed. I have spent a lot of time reading up in laymans terms since Saturday and aside from cancerous tumours, older horses who carry a lot of fat seem to be prone to fatty tumours in this area. The tumour can drop suddenly and cause a strangulation or twist in the small intestine causing great pain that drugs will not alleviate. It's quite scary when you start reading up on the equine digestive tract but basically it could have happened at any time, sooner or later.......

I hope you are coping better with the loss of Oliver, Barnaby Bear. A week is a small milestone and you are in my thoughts.

Would be interested to hear from anyone who has used alternative wormers and where to get them.

 

[sugar mouse]

Thanks for the advice on Panacur Equine Guard and resistance, Border Reiver.

Given my circumstances (above) and worming history, I shouldn't think that would be a problem for mine as at most, some of the oldies will have been treated only twice with it before.

Your thoughts would be welcome.

 

[brighteyes]

The way to be sure would have been a post mortem - then you might have been spared all the speculating and angst. I'm really sorry though. The loss of a special horse and good friend is desperately sad, however it happens and whatever the cause.