Bone Spavin - second steroid injection required?

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Hi All

My pony was diagnosed with Bone Spavin last summer - he had the steroid injection, lateral extensions shoes and is on Synequin supplement.

He was going fine, better than ever schooling wise, up until the end of last year.

Then a series of setbacks (colic, lots of snow, waiting for new surface etc) put our schooling back and when I went for a lesson a couple of weeks ago he was very stiff and not wanting to go forward. He was okay hacking.

Vet came last week and agreed that he looked stiffer/choppier behind on the lunge / flexion tests and so is having in him for x-rays to see if/what changes have occured and possibly another steroid injection. He is still under the insurance until June.

So a couple of questions: Has anyone experienced similar - i.e fine at first but needed another injection 6 months later? How long did the injection last after then?

Tildren - I meant to mention this to my vet but forgot. Vet has never mentioned this as a treatment though it seems to get a good write up on here, any reasons why it is not suitable?

Vet is on holiday now so I can't ask him. Pony going in for xrays on 15th April. I can continue to hack him but no schooling.

Any experiences / opinions gratefully received
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Is that the adequan injection, I know someone whose horse has spavins and she had two injections of adequan 2yrs ago and touch wood he's been fine so far and she's back to competing and not needed any more injections since. So yes, you may only need a second one ?

Good luck for xrays, am taking a horse to hospital tomorrow for xrays on stifles, he had a sub-chondrial cyst in each stifle, poor lad, and has had steroid injections into the joint to ease the inflammation. Tomorrow will tell us if all that treatment worked (keep fingers crossed)
 
Usually they inject a combination of adequan/hyaluronate/a steroid.

Tildren is really good in some cases but may not work if disease is quite advanced. Is he insured (as its v expensive and has to be given slow IV) so maybe thats why vet not mentioned it?
 
He is insured (runs out in June) and vet said it was early stages (according to x-rays last summer, will find out more 15th) so not sure why vet hasn't mentioned Tildren? He is 17yo - would age having any bearing?
 

My last horse had bone spavin and had his hock medicated when he was about 14, I was just about thinking of having the hock injected again, just over a year later when I unfortunately lost him to a puncture wound. The vet thought in his case the injection would work for about a year or so and was right. Hope this helps.
 
Thank you for your reply, it does help - sorry to hear about your horse.

I know my question is a bit like 'how long is a piece of string'?, the vet did warn me that all horses respond differently, I'm just wondering whether if they require a second injection they are more likely to need a 3rd, 4th, 5th..
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It depends on the severity of the bone spavin as to whether a horse is a good candidate or not for Tildren and it depends on what the vet is trying to acheive with your horse regarding the spavin. In some instances the idea of spavin is to get the hock bones to fuse. However this is not always suitable in a lot of cases and then Tildren would be used. Tildren inhibits bone fusing so it might be in your horses case the bone has already fused in places which is why the vet hasn't offered to use it. My horse had Tildren in Nov last year and the vet recommended another course in May of this year. 'He had intraarticular injections into the hock of a hyaluoronate substance and anti inflammatories and he also had a course of Adequan which was one injection per week for seven weeks. During this time he was brought back into full work, and touch wood has been relatively fine since then although there was at some point (and possibly still is) an indication my horse also has kissing spine as he has been showing some of the symptoms of this due presumably to overcompensation from the pain he had in his hocks. I think my vet wanted to throw every drug he could at my horse, but it was probably because he was the ideal candidate for these drugs as his spavin was at the point where these drugs were most effective. A word of advice - Equine America do an excellent joints supplement that has 10,000mg of glucosamine and MSM. MSM has been shown to be very effective in cases of mild bone spavin. It is approx £15 a tub and each tub last approx 4-6 months, which makes it extremely cost effective when fed to horses of 600kg like my horse (17.1hh W.B). Also worth noting that Tildren is approx £350 - £400 a shot and is infused over an hour intraveinously into your horses neck. The reason for this is that it does have side effects and although minimal it is worth considering whether these side effects are worth the risk. The main one is colic, but there is another side effect which researchers have shown which is risk of heart attack in horses that have cariac arrythmia but this risk is lessened by a longer infusion time. I was worried about my horse because he is extremely colic prone and also has caridac arrythmia but he was absolutely fine and I would recommend having it if your vet thinks your horse is a candidate for this drug. You can get more info if you google 'Tildren drug information sheet' which is available online from the manufacturer and gives the information in greater detail. Good luck x
 
If it helps a friends horse was injected twice for bone spavin (steroids and ha) as the first one didn't make much difference, and has been fine for the last 8 years...has competed elementary since, although does take a little longer to loosen up straight from the stable.
 
[ QUOTE ]
If it helps a friends horse was injected twice for bone spavin (steroids and ha) as the first one didn't make much difference, and has been fine for the last 8 years...has competed elementary since, although does take a little longer to loosen up straight from the stable.

[/ QUOTE ]

Hi

My horse was diagnosed with bone spavin in 2006, he got one injection into both hocks in the December 06 and then needed a secon july 07. He went lame again there in Dec 08 and I thought it was the hocks again, so vet took x-rays to compare against the first set taken in 2006 and there was hardly any change. Turned out he was actually lame somewhere else.
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Anyway vet said to try and ride him through it and if needed he would do it again but he didnt see the need to rush and do it their and then. Anyway he still hasnt had it done.

He competes at Affiliated dressage at Elementary level and he is now 14yrs old.

I did ask about the Tildrin but vet wasnt in favour of it for him
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dont know why, didnt ask.

Hope this helps a little, as every horse is different.

Good luck and hope everything is ok on the 15th.
 
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