bandaging problems help please

cptrayes

cptrayes

Well-Known Member
Joined
4 March 2008
Messages
14,748
Visit site
My hunter got kicked badly over the summer, which has left him with a big lump of damage to the tendon that runs down the front of the leg, just above the knee. The tendon works fine and he is jumping like he always has, but the lump and the knee fill with fluid, a legacy of where there was so much filling when the injury was active. (It was horrific!) I have been bandaging it to keep it a reasonable size, but he is getting pressure sores down the back of the leg. I have tried acavallo gel bandages, fibagee, neoprene and cut up geleze saddle pad to protect it and I thought that I had it cracked only to find that although the skin was pink when I took off the bandage in the morning it has again died away from underneath and more hair has fallen off in scabby, sticky clumps.


Is there any way that anyone knows to bandage his knee long term without causing sores up the back?
 
There isn't any point in draining it, it will simply refill. I've had horses with smaller bursae like it before and always had the same advice. The vet who did his flu jab agreed. If it's not active inflammation, then it's simply a pocket left from where everything was stretched so badly by the original injury and it fills with fliud. It's a horrible blemish, it's amazing he still jumps the hedges he does! I could cry about it but I know that I am lucky he is still alive, never mind sound, so I try not to think about how beautiful he was before it happened.

Tubigrip will slip down where his leg is thinner. To stop it I would have to put bandage tape around a part of his leg above the bump and that would cause another pressure point. It might be worth a try - does anyone else have any experience of tubigrips used on a joint being better at preventing pressure sores???
 
Hmm the trouble is though that you are bandaging a moving part an i would put money on the fact that it is the bending the limb that causes the extreme pressure.

What about a small tubigrip with a round of vet wrap above the knee to stop it sliding down?
 
How have you been bandaging it up to this point - with a figure 8 bandage? Have you tried a neoprene or even magnetic knee wrap/boot?

I have to say, the only way I've successfully bandaged knees without pressure issues or slipping by bandaging the lower leg, too. So not really an option for you. :(
 
You could try placing "sausage" pads at the pressure points. Just wrap some kband or the like in a circle shape and place over the pressure points - then bandage as usual over the top. Should keep the bandage from getting too tight in that area and rubbing. Unfortunately with most longterm bandaging you are going to get some rubbing.
Do you stable bandage lower limbs too? Is there anyway you can turn out more/ stable in a barn so he can move more? Have you had any sucess with leg tightening gels?
 
Had a horse with a similar injury years ago and the advice from the vet then was to not bandage it, it would gradually settle down by itself to near normal size but to hose the leg at least twice a day including straight after exercise. He was right, it did but it took nearly a year and odd days it would fill again but not as much.
 
Maesfen that is an extremely reassuring post, thankyou. If I can hope that it will reduce in size for a year, even if excruciatingly slowly as it is now, then I have something to aim for. The trouble is that he was so perfect, and so magnificent (other people's description of him, total strangers, not mine!) that it is soul destroying to see him so badly blemished. He was out again today jumping five foot hedges and I try to tell myself that's all that matters, but it isn't working :(

Thanks also for the suggestion above which has given me the idea that I could put a sausage of neoprene or gel pad on either side of the back of his knee, which would remove the pressure altogether from the back, which would sit inside a tunnel. I might try that, because as someone else says, the problem is caused by him bending the knee and the bandage tightening in the folds of the bend.

To answer another question, no I could not figure-of-eight it because the filling is from three inches above his knee where the damage is to the bottom of the knee joint and including the entire front of the knee, so it all needs to be kept under pressure.

I did try bandaging the lower leg too, but it didn't stay up :( It will only stay up if I ring his leg with bandage tape above the swelling. It isn't the tape causing the sores, it's lower down behind the joint.

I think I will see how it goes without, as per Maesfen's vet, and if it comes up so big I can't look at it without wincing, I'll try the sausages. I've thought about tubigrip but he is a shire x 17 hander and it would be difficult to find one which would go on his normal knee, never mind his big one!

Glenruby he is turned out in the day and in a 90ft barn at night. Heaven knows what it would look like if he stood in a 12x12 all night :o

Bruce I am just off to hide in a dark cupboard for the night now.
 
Last edited:
I wound surely try leaving it unbandaged as Maesfen says or this problem will go on for life. If you really must bandage try using Gamgee or fibergee and cut out a circle to place behind the knee so he can bend without causing pressure, use duck tape or vetrap at the top to stop it slipping.
Hope it helps. Just think how awful it would be without your baby and how lucky you are to have him, A gamy knee is a small price to pay.
Let me describe one of my brood mares (the prettiest one of course)
her stifle locks if she lays down too much (which is hereditary)
she is Rinopolmonite positive
she has an allergic reaction to sun light so she lives in during the day
she suffers from placenta previa (red bag)
Yep ,she is a nightmare!!!
recently she had a really bad colic and went to the clinic, a week after the first operation the vet called to say she was down again and they had to open her up or she would die. I said NO, let her go and that I would be in the next morning to kiss her goodbye.
Well I cried all night and I was so upset it was an awful experience. I went in the morning to see her and say goodbye and the vet was very happy with himself, he told me that he couldn't let her go as she was so pretty and such a lovely mare that he operated on her and that i won't have to pay as it was his decision. I was over the moon. All her illnesses mean that she can't reproduce so she is just there to keep me happy. She is now the Aunty for the yearlings and is very good at her job.
What I am try to say is often we want perfection and don't realise that what we have is enough to make us happy.
hugs aand vibes ----------------------
 
I've got a Pressage knee boot with zip down the back, it's for a TB type leg though, but you're welcome to borrow it if it's the right size. you could then put gamgee or something in the areas at the front that need more pressure, perhaps.
tbh though if it's sore and losing hair at the back, I would leave it unbandaged for at least a month or so.
 
Kerilli that's a lovely offer thanks but if you saw him you would understand why I broke into a broad smile at the idea that a TB pressage would fit him :)

Qaz thanks, I checked out the pressage and found a price of about £80!! Since then, though, he has lost a patch of hair an inch wide and about six inches long where the bandage constricts, so I think that a pressage may still cause a problem. He is oddly thin skinned for a big horse with a lot of Shire and ID in him. I don't even pull his mane. Can you tell me how big the hole at the back is, I can't see from the photos?

We hunted yesterday and his knee is no bigger today, so for the moment I'll have to leave well alone until the hair is all back again. I'm using cornucrescine to grow the hair (it works!) and vitamin E to stop the scarring. My OH is just wiring up a set of medical cold laser diodes so that I can laser the front, because that has good results on ligament and tendon damage and fluid filled brusae in tests.

Other than that, I'm just going to have to thank my lucky stars he has full movement in the knee and still loves his hedges, when there are people out there who would give their eye teeth to be able to own any horse, let alone one as lovely as he is.

Here he is two weeks ago and if you look hard you can see the left knee.

http://www.klickonfotos.co.uk/photo_galleries/250910cf/pages/250910cf 138.htm
 
Last edited:
cptrayes said:
My OH is just wiring up a set of medical cold laser diodes so that I can laser the front, because that has good results on ligament and tendon damage and fluid filled bursae in tests.
Click to expand...

He is beautiful, though see what you mean about his poor knee! :( Reckon that the laser diodes are a good plan. Did you buy them individually rather than as a ready made handset. Where did you find them? I've been looking for ages (on & off - usually when someone manages to damage themselves!) for IR LEDs of very specific wavelengths as they've been shown (by NASA) to speed wound healing - but can't get them from standard electronics places and the ready made ones are prohibitively expensive! :eek:
 
I like dioades idea!!

One of my mares has a lovely habit of inuring herself...commonly involving puncture wounds.
Sje injured her left knee last winter resulting in just above the knee filling with fluid....for weeks i bandaged and hsoed it with no luck....so i figured she was just going to have to be left with a blemish. ten months on and there is no longer any fluidy lump and her leg is back to normal....
when i did bandage it i banadaged before the knee normal then incorporated a figure of 8 for actual knee as it helped the bandage stay in place and i used vetrap on top.
and it kept pressure off the back of the knee.

I`m sure time is all it will take
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top