Atrial Fibrillation

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ken1

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My boy has this morning been diagnosed with Atrial Fibrillation but it is yet to be confirmed by the vets. He is 10 yo TB and the only symtoms he had was drinking heavily overnight (two buckets) and every other day not wanting to work much.

If AF is diagnosed they are suggesting treatment with Quinindine but I think there are risks to this treatment. I've heard that the Canadians have had success with using electrical therapy to restabilise the heartbeat.

Has anyone had any experience of either method?
 
My mum actually had this done. Whilst the obvious difference is that she is human and your boy is equine I should think the same thing would apply. Mum was heavily sedated and the heart adjusted with paddles on the chest to restart it and get it back into rhythm. however after a week it went back to how it was before, she was warned this could happen. It doesn't affect her only in as much as she gets the odd flutter and palpatation.
 
I had horse with AF and treatment is risky, you have too hope that they come right on first dosage of drugs, as they can try up to three times with drugs and more treatment the riskier it gets.
I was very luckly as my horse only had one treatment of drugs and came back to normal heartbeat.
Tis a very common condition you'll be surprised, tis found alot in racehorses.
One thing i will warned you, i gave a lovely in condition TB and due to drugs etc....... got back a total hat rack back!!, but with lots of TLC he was a right as rain and even after a couples of years had exclusion removed from insurance policy.
Treatment is risky but worked for my boy, good luck
 
Side effects are from quinidine toxicity and include laminitis, colic, collapse, swelling around the throat and other heart rythm irregularities.
The huge difference between humans and horses is that the horse's primary purpose is as an athlete - therefore requiring a huge cardiac reserve. Its mostly seen in horses in heavy work eg eventing, racing or hunting.

I presume your vet listened to your horses heart. Hed have heard an irregularly irregular rythm which indicates AF. Believe me, its difficult to mistake. Your horse would need to be admitted for definitive diagnosis requiring ECG. treatment should not occur the same day as AF can spontaneously rectify in the first week or so of occurance so standard practice to diagnose and then arrange to treat one week later. To avoid quinidine toxicity your horse will be monitored continuosly by ECG for 24hrs before, during and afer teatment. we usually start ECG at 8am after a full physical. Then tx strts at 10am and a dose of quinidine is given every 2 hrs until conversion is seen (usually about 6-8hrs). Treatment is usually successful if there is no underlying heart condition (eg murmur, myocardial disease).
I do not know of anywhere currently using electrical conversion and quinidine conversion is the gold standard in both Europe and the US.
I have seen a number of TB racehorses and yearlings about to start training being treated for this using quinidine and all (thankfully) have converted and returned to training.
Hope its a success for you.
smile.gif
 
My IDxTB was diagnosed with A-Fib over 3 years ago he was 12yo. He was refered to Mark Patterson at Bushy Equine who is one of our leading Equine cardiologists.

Mark did a full investigation & confirmed Atril Fib he also does the Quinidine there & would highly recommend him. My horse didnt convert & i was fully aware of the risks. Mark knew that i didnt want the quinidine pushing to the extreme.

We also found out that my horse had Vetricular Tacycardia which Mark advised for him to be retired from work straight away as this was dangerous, is closely linked to Sudden death syndrome.
My horse does ok, he has a good quality of life but if that was to change i would PTS he is a field ornement.

I would advise you to contact Mark as he is very good & deals with numerous cases everyday. He was looking in to the Shock therapy 3 years ago it is exactly the same as what we do in Humans for the same thing. The length of time a horse has had A-fib can also be a factor as to how easily it will convert so Mark Told us anyway.

Quinidine is a highly invasive procedure & not a comfortable thing to put a horse through. They started Sam at 11am & where still going with him at 11pm he was then monitored overnight as it does make the horse colic. Sam was there for a week & was allowed home 3 days after the procedure.
He was still colicky when he got home & wouldnt eat for a week, he would eat carrots though.
But he pulled through, there was a chance that a 2nd go with Quinidine would work but i felt it was to risky to put my horse through it & with the complication of Tacycardia he still wouldnt of been ridable.

The risks i face now are Heart Disease or sudden death.
 
also thinking about it, one year i remember at Badminton one of Mary Kings eventer stopping after steeplechase phase (it was last year of proper format) with AF and horse come back into work sound and winning.
Defo much higher success rate as 'other poster' says if no other underlaying heart conditions
 
Thanks everyone for your comments, I now know what to expect and how to manage this situation.

I guess it was such a shock after providing so much TLC and getting him into a great condition and seeing how much he loves his jumping now, that he has a major problem.

Thanks again.
 
I have an aged gelding who was diagnosed some 5 years ago with AF. Problems noted at the time were some oedema in the girth area and flared nostrils at exercise with a general slowdown. As he was 25 the vet said quinidine was not an option as it would probably finish him off. He has survived quite happily as a field ornament ever since. I think I read at the time that the sooner treatment is started the better the chance of a positive outcome. Did you get any possible explanation as to the cause of the AF and as to why the extra drinking? Mine has just started to drink rather more but I had half put it down to his Cushings.
 
Vet suspects the cause of the AT may be viral but didn't go into detail over the cause of the drinking, he wanted to wait until the boy had seen the cardiologist. Took bloods thought to test. The odd thing about all this is (for example) on Sunday he was really lively and we had a great workout together and he was fit and really together but then on Monday he just couldn't be bothered.
Tuesday he was mooey but then he had just been shoed and he's always a bit tight for a day or two after that.
 
I have an endurance horse that at a ride was found to have AF
We had completed about 35 miles of a 60 mile Race Ride, when he suddenly stopped then he seemed fine.At the vet gate the vet told us to take it easy and we would finish the ride. At the next vet gate he had improved and went onto be 3rd.

I took him to Liphook Equine Hospital where he had an ECG but they did not find anything.

He had blood and urine tests done and the only thing they found was that his sodium and magnesium were although still in the theraputic range, they were both at the bottom. I now give him some salt and Magnisium in his feed at night.
Since doing this I have not had a problem

Some times AF can be due to an electrolyte imbalance.
 
My horse had atrial fibrillation and had the quinidine treatment but as the valves of his heart were seriously damaged the treatment was useless.
The cause of the damage was thought to be associated with the herpes virus.
 
Thank you, this is really useful. We took the boy to Liphook yesterday and whilst they confirmed the AF at rest, heart rate went to normal when on the lunge. Troponin has come back as normal therefore no heart disease (Phew!).

Now waiting for results of electrolyte so fingers crossed etc.

The only other variable we can think of is that we started him on Pro Feet three months ago.
 
It was always my dream to own a horse so last year I bought a 6yr old TB who done a small bit of racing and eventing possibly. I had him for 3 months (wasn't worked that much) when he collapsed in his field twice and was diagonised with AF. He got ECG done on him on numberous occassions and was treated 2 weeks ago with Quinidine and came around quite quickly from it. But when another ECG was done there was a still a slight irregular beat while in his stable but when was taken out of his stable that beat became normal. He was then diagonised with a 2nd degree which is quite common in horses, now he is on a special diet of watercress, carrots and is on 2months rest without cantering and galloping in a field. Any ideas if he will be ok after these 2months??
 
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