Bringing back into work...

kathantoinette

kathantoinette

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...after a full year off.

My cob was diagnosed with tears in his DDFT and recommended 6 months off. He will have had a full year off by Feb/March next year. He looks sound when trotting in the field, vet will be coming out prior to restarting work for a lameness work up.

I'm sure the vets will give me advice for the programme for bringing back to into work but in the meantime just wondered what advice any of you guys have? i.e. how much walk to start with building up over how long, then trot etc.

He's a good steady boy so not worried about the inhand walking from a behavioural point of view. I have a school and also plenty of fields to walk around.

Thanks in advance :)
 
Take it slowly!

Usually you start hand walking prior to turn out so in my opinion if he's on turn out then start with hacking out in walk.

My mare has done hers twice now. The first time she was operated on and we took it very slowly taking over 12 months to getting back to jumping from when we first sat on her. We did lots of walk (3months) then trotting in straight lines. We didn't take her back in the school till 6 months into work.
She jumped for a further two years until being chased in the field and re-injuring it. She's has had 18 months off nowafter injuring for a second time and is being hacked out now after weaning her foal. We walked for 12 weeks and are now doing 10 min of trot all in a straight line. No circles for months!

After a second injury I don't turn her out with my boys during the winter as mud is huge risk. She's sensible on her own whereas the boys want to play!!

My mare is sound (although both injuries were very small) but will never be jumped after the second injury as she is just too precious to me

Wish you all the luck
 
The last one I brought back into work following a tendon injury, he had 7 months field rest after the box rest so missed nearly 12 months work, did 7 weeks walking out on the roads starting with 20 mins or so increasing to 11/2 hours pretty much 6 days a week all while still living out 24/7, then short trots were introduced building up little by little, he started short canters after about 5 weeks of trotting, he remained sound raced again and is still here at livery now as a RC allrounder.

We took longer than the vet suggested when we started, 4 weeks was the vets advice, we nearly doubled it as we wanted him to have every chance of coming right and staying sound, so my advice would be go slowly the more walking the better, we did it all ridden he had been walked extensively in hand before the 7 months turned away so no need to repeat that.
 
My cob tore his DDFT several years ago when he was about 17 and had arthroscopy and stem cell surgery. He had about a year off in total as it took a while for us to get a firm diagnosis and then i didn't opt for surgery straight away as he was field sound (but became a hooligan when retired so clearly needed to have surgery and come back into work)!!

We started out with hand grazing and i think walker before introducing turnout in a very small paddock (with ACP the first few times!), but thankfully he was very sensible! I think we then spent about 2-3 months just walking (starting out 10minutes in school and building it up to 60mins walking), then another 4-6weeks introducing trot work and then one month building up the canter work. He came completely sound (for an old horse!) after that and came back into work for 3 years managing 6days a week mostly hacking, doing very very light schooling and even jumped a couple of times. He unfortunately contracted laminitis last year and has had a series of abscesses, so has been off work since last summer but if not i suspect would have kept going!

Good luck with the rehab.
 
A tip my vet gave when we started walk work from a fetlock injury was to start at 15 minutes walking for a week then increase by 1 minute a day till we were up to 1.5 hours walking then we could introduce short straight line trot bursts.
 
be positive said:
The last one I brought back into work following a tendon injury, he had 7 months field rest after the box rest so missed nearly 12 months work, did 7 weeks walking out on the roads starting with 20 mins or so increasing to 11/2 hours pretty much 6 days a week all while still living out 24/7, then short trots were introduced building up little by little, he started short canters after about 5 weeks of trotting, he remained sound raced again and is still here at livery now as a RC allrounder.

We took longer than the vet suggested when we started, 4 weeks was the vets advice, we nearly doubled it as we wanted him to have every chance of coming right and staying sound, so my advice would be go slowly the more walking the better, we did it all ridden he had been walked extensively in hand before the 7 months turned away so no need to repeat that.
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This is the kind of rehab plan I've done too. A lot of roadwork/stable hard tracks and kept off the soft for a good while.

Would also ask the age of the horse? Only because I've noticed how much more slowly my injured horse has healed, as she ages, and therefore how much more careful and patient the rehab has needed to be.

You won't do any harm by going slowly and being cautious. Not sure of the degree of injury, but with my old girl who really did a proper job on her leg we re-scanned at each stage to check the healing before upping the workload.
 
I just wanted to add that the tb did all his rehab work unshod, I wanted to give him the chance to build up his dreadful feet and get his heels strong enough to function properly which to my mind was a key part of the tendon being supported during the return to work, he was shod to race but they came off once he finished and is still barefoot most of the year, he now has fantastic feet that look nothing like they did when he first arrived.
 
Do you have access to quiet lanes/tarmac if so then I'd leave the shoes off (get them off now if they aren't already) and then just take your time. Walk hacking on the lanes. Start at 10/15 mins and add 10 minutes a week until you are up to 90 mins if possible. Depends on your work situation though I appreciate.
 
Just to add to the above, whilst barefoot is great in some instances, you may find that your horse needs the support of shoes after such an injury so be open minded and see what works best for your horse. We tried to leave my boy barefoot in front but he didn't take to it well and we ended up having to shoe him (normal shoes but have heard from others that they found heart bar to be necessary).

Also I agree with doing lots of hard surface work - we started in the school initially just to make sure he was sensible, but we had a very good wax surface that wasn't deep and was well maintained. We quickly progressed to hacking him on tarmac/hard ground and we stayed away from very soft ground/deep surfaces for quite a while!
 
ycbm said:
Where was the tear? I'd suggest very different rehab for inside the foot to outside the foot.
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The tear was inside the foot.

And to add - he has had field rest the whole time, no box rest.

Also he has front shoes on - raised heart bar shoes, as per vets instructions.

Thanks for all the advice/comments so far :)
 
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