Colic - need suggestions.

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micramadam

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First a bit of background history. Sorry if it's an essay but I think this is necessary in order to understand the extent of the problem.
Rising 14 yr KWPN mare. 1st foal almost 2 years ago and a very hard long birth. The foal was huge and she ended up with an infection in her womb and unstable hips? The womb problem was treated and the hip problem comes and goes and is being treated every few months by a physio and accupuncturist.
The colic problems started soon after the foal was weaned. At first we thought that she was allergic to haylage so we changed her to hay only.That seemed to solve the problem for a while.
This last year though she has had numerous colic attacks. They aren't days apart though, they are weeks apart. We haven't changed her food apart from to make it very wet and have also started to add sunflower oil. This was the vet's advice after the last time.
She gets 1/2 kg sport nuts, 1/2 kg Havens muesli, a large handful of Pavo Daily Plus (chaf mix) & 1 scoop of Moody Mare. She gets this twice a day (the Moody Mare supplement only once a day). She doesn't need a lot as she is a very good doer!
Then the penny dropped on the last attack and I looked back at the dates of the attacks. It seems that they are about on average every 3 weeks. Latest attack was today (twice) and I've now told the vet that enough is enough and I want a full investigation done.
So they've taken blood today and are sending it off to be checked. The next step if the blood comes back clean is to scan her womb / ovaries. The vet today (not our usual one) said more likely to be bowel problems.
Now I am no vet but my instincts are screaming at me that it is womb or ovary related especially as it seems to be in cycle.
Has anyone else had a mare with similar problems? Did you manage to solve it and how?
Please help. All constructive suggestions are welcome. I'm terrified that one of these times I am going to lose her to colic.:(
Forgot to add that prior to the foal, she had NEVER suffered from colic, accident prone yes, but colic no.
 
I can see how worrying it must be for you, and it would be brilliant if you could find the cause of the repeat colics and find some way of reducing them.

I don't have any direct experience of this, but a few things I'd be wondering would be:

- is the 3 weekly incidence a red herring at the moment, in that most mares will not be truly coming into season over winter. So does the apparent 3 week cycle relate to something else, like cold weather conditions (and problems of frozen water troughs and reduced drinking)?

- Does it relate to any other medications, wormers, supplements being given at certain intervals? Or to stressful events like travelling, hunts taking place nearby, anything like that?

- Access to grazing is known to reduce the incidence of colic. Does her pattern of colics relate to varying access to fresh grass?

- It is also known that colic risk can be reduced further if those horses who have access to lush spring grass are also given access to hay.

- I've no idea what's in the hard feed you are giving her, but I'd be tempted to try to reduce the feed to forage only (grass, hay) gradually and only add in any minerals/vitamins which are shown to be deficient by forage analysis. Feeding of concentrates of over 2.5kg/day has been shown to increase the incidence of colic.

- Changes in any part of the diet are known to increase the risk of colic, so whatever changes you make, do make them gradually

- There are some reports that colic risk increases if horses are suddenly box-rested or have their exercise reduced.

- Worth having your mare wormcounted through faeces and a tapeworm blood test to check whether that is playing any part in repeated episodes, and making sure that the worming programme and general management is appropriate

That's all I can come up with at the moment, but maybe that will help a little?

Sarah
 
Not sure if my post will help, but it sounds a little like gut damage. If I was you I'd get them to check the bloods as this is a starting point, I'd then get them to scan the ovaries to see if there are any abnormalities. They can also scan part of the gut at the same time with the scanner - not a normal thing but can be done (our vets did it for Arkadia as we knew surgery wasn't an option)

Whilst they are doing this, I'd also get them to scope her if you haven't already, then you can rule out the other bits like ulcers. You seem imo to be feeding quite a lot for a good doer and after the posting recently about garlic and previous posts about it increasing acidity - I believe its in the havens muesli? I don't know whats in Pavo daily plus? or your sports nuts, but if she's a good doer, then suggest a fibre only, pink powder or the like supplement?

Also have you tried coligone, it does in some reoccurring cases have some great effects - theres a person on here who can give you more info, they are also extremely helpful on the phone?

Most of all, I wish you good luck, we had a mare like this who started colic, that's where our foal was orphaned at 3 months, so not sure if the demands on the mums system have any effects. We believe as we didn't have a history for the mare that it was much more likely to be long term worm damage.

Also meant to say, agree with all of Sarah's advice above :-)
 
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Did she colic at the time of foaling at all? How soon after foaling did the colics start? One thing that springs to mind with her history would be that she sustained intestinal damage during foaling, that wasn't severe enough to require surgical correction but perhaps led to the formation of adhesions, which would fit with the recurrent colic episodes. I have seen several mares with post-foaling surgical colic where the intestine has been damaged during foaling, either the foal has damaged the blood supply to a section of intestine or the intestine itself.

However there is also the saying 'common things are common', so I would want to rule out other causes of recurrent colic not related to ovaries/foaling trauma, so tapeworm ELISAs / ulcers etc. Then start looking into scanning ovaries and abdomen. Unfortunately, there are cases of recurrent colic where there is nothing to be found on any tests, and I have seen cases that have ended up having surgery despite only colicking mildly, to try to determine the cause.
 
Thanks for all the advice. It is very much appreciated. This grey mare is tunring me grey!

She didn't colic when foaling but shortly after the foal was weaned. (at 8 months old).

The mares over here (quite a lot from what I hear and have seen) have cycled all through this winter.
I'm don't think her colic has anything to do with the winter (reduced drinking, grazing, frozen water etc. ) as she suffers from colic in the summer as well even when her grazing is limited. She has always,(from birth - her breeder is the livery owner), been stabled at night and out at grass through the day and she has hay overnight. Most of the year she is out through the day and in at night but since end of November she has stabled more than I would like.

If we find nothing after all the test, scans etc. then I'll give the Coligone a try. I'm willing to try anything at this stage. Where can I get it?

Normally she is in dressage training 5/6 times a week for a minimum of 45 minutes at a time. She'll be lucky if she's ever had 2.5 kgs of hard food a day even in full intensive competition mode. (typing error for the museli that should have been 1/4 KG)
Even so we have reduced her food right down to just a handful of nuts, muesli and Pavo Daily Plus (just a chaf mix to slow her eating down) just to have something to mix the Moody Mare supplement with. That is the only supplement she gets. We are also thoroughly soaking what she does get in Sunflower Oil now so that it is a really oily mix. (Vet's suggestion and also from someone who had a horse colic every week until they started with the oil).
Someone also suggested that the Moody Mare supplement could be causing this? Anyone got any info on this?

We've been through all the scenarios that Flintfootfilly kindly listed THANK YOU!) and there have been no changes in her routine or food that have not been introduced very slowly. She is really puzzling us.

The bloods are due back tomorrow so we'll start with that first. If they're ok, then we'll have her ovaries and gut scanned and take it from there. I'll also ask them to scope for ulcers and to check for adhesions.

She is a beautiful talented mare and already produced 1 stunning foal and some fantastic dressage results. I would really like to put her back in foal at some stage if possible. I already have buyers for any future foals. However, I am loathe to do this if she is going to suffer from regular episodes of colic.
First we'll sort the colic out, then (hopefully) continue competing with her in dressage for the next 2 years and then if she is still fit and healthy, put her back in foal.
 
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Be interested to hear the blood results, also whether she's had worm issues in the past as well?

The people who developed coligone are http://www.hbradshaws.co.uk/ we tried it but it didn't work for us, although we believe the damage was too large in the older mare and there were underlying problems with the youngster. I have also used it with a friends stress mare and in this case there were significant positive differences over a period of time. Pink powder is also said to have a similar effect, but imo its best to get to the root of the cause rather than treat, which is what you are doing.

It may be worth looking at the stabled incidents and see if this is a trigger as you say she has been in more than you prefer. Also we were recommend to soak everything to ensure as much moisture is absorbed as possible - dehydration can be a cause, and I'm not sure if this is something you have looked at? It can be hard in the cold weather?
 
Looks like you have plenty of good suggestions now.

Just one more thought. I'd be a bit cautious about feeding too much oil/fat to a good doer. Fat is stored much more effectively than energy from fibre, so a good doer can start to really pile on the pounds. Also, once the fat is stored, there is increasing evidence that it can start to behave metabolically to cause/increase insulin resistance, which is associated with laminitis.

I did increase fat fed to one of my gang a while back, but watched his weight like a hawk. Even within a few weeks, he had a noticeable weight gain, despite reducing his fibre ration simultaneously.

Worth remembering that weight for weight, fat/oil is about 6 times as calory-dense as carbohydrate, so you will need to reduce part of the ration to keep the number of calories constant.

All in all, I think I'd just soak her hay in water, and forget about the oil for now, until you have narrowed down the cause and can weigh up the risks more accurately.

Sarah
 
Good point about the oil. I'll bear that in mind.

I think that worm damage is probably unlikely as she has had a regular worming programme since birth, but saying that, you never know.

We had been soaking her food since her colic episode in December. Is more of a drink than food! What I will say is that her stable is a nightmare to keep clean - she is so wet. She does drink a lot. We have seen this over the last 2 weeks because the pipes have been frozen in the extreme cold and we have had tubs in all the stables which were topped up at least 4 times a day. We could see how much they all were drinking. I have been very vigilant in making sure that she drinks enough in case that was a symptom.

I'm ringing the vet today to see if the bloods are back and then we'll see. Have already contacted my insurance company as I needed to inform them that this would be an ongoing bill and they are in agreement that it requires further investigation. Whether they did or not would not have made much difference as I would have paid myself anyway.
Now just have to decide which clinic I take her to - a university clinic in Utrecht ( lots of students involved in the treatment under the supervision of extremely experienced vet) or a clinic that is specialised in breeding problems besides the 'normal' things.

I'd just like to say I really appreciate all the information you lot are giving me. I hadn't considered adhesions or ulcers.
I'll keep you informed as I believe this sort of information is handy for everyone to know.
Thanks again.
 
Just had the blood results from the vet.
She has an elevated liver count. Not huge but enough to indicate that something is not right. :(
For the next 3 weeks she will be on antibiotics in case it is just an infection and also on prednison for 4 weeks and then slowly reducing the prednison week by week until she has a week without medication and then they will repeat the blood test.
If the colic is still occurring or if the count has not reduced to normal levels then they will look at scanning the ovaries, the bowel and the stomach.

If it is an infection then she has had this for a long time - that makes me feel really guilty that I haven't pushed for blood tests earlier. My poor mare. :(

I will also be taking her off the Moody mare immediately. No wonder she was moody, she hasn't been/isn't well but she has still been performing with marks regularly over 70% in affiliated dressage (Dutch equivalent). What a trooper.
 
Suggest protein gut balancer as maintenance, absolutely fantastic for gut damage. Suggest also getting s. equjne analysis fine - I used forest farmacy to get a supplement drawn up to give your mare everything she needs after the antibiotics have been in, my horse regularly colic'd and he had some liver damage, the supplements improved his condition quickly.
 
Quick update.
She's coliced twice more this week. Wednesday and a particularly nasty bout today. I'm living on tenterhooks. I have to work full time but I hate leaving her at the minute. Luckily I have a superb yard owner who is checking her numerous times throughout the day.
Had been unable to give her the antibiotics / prednison as she had diarrhea. She had her first dose of both this morning and then we had the colic attack at 2pm. Vet out again to give her buscopan which does the trick within 15 minutes for her. He has been doing some more research and it could be a bowel infarction.
Have read up on this and it can be caused by parasites which surprises me as she has had regular worming since birth and not always the same wormer!
Vet advised not to give any more antibiotics. Prednison is to be continued and now I have to give her blood thinning medicine as well.
I want to give the medicine a chance to work but think that is she colics again during this next week I should take her to the Equine clinic for investigation. I also notice today that she has lost weight since last week.
She could afford to lose a little but not too much. Hopefully she won't lose too much more.
 
I feel for you, we've been through the multiple colics with an older mare then her foal (loosing her at 18 months old) in the last couple of years, plus loosing an oldie.

Parasites are a problem, worms being the best known and having had reoccurant pin worm problems from hell in one of my horses, the resistance caused by regular dosing is not yet known in its entirety and we happily stuff our animals full of chemicals in prevention! my rant won't help your problem.

I suggest if your insurance or wallet permits, send your horse now, don't wait, this has been going on for a long period of time and you are going to possibly end up in a critical situation where operating will be the only answer - the problem then, is they open up and don't fully investigate for example if they open and find nothing just inflammation, then they will simply close without cutting the intestine.

Pre and pro biopics may help with the gut flora, not sure but prednision is a anti inflammatory?

Hope all goes well, keep us informed and GOOD LUCK, hope they find the source! XX
 
Iconique thanks so much for your words of support. There are times when I could bawl my eyes out.
The prednison is for the possible liver problem that showed up in the blood tests.
I really want to take her to the clinic and will if she has one more bout of colic but I also want to see if the medicine will work and that hopefully it is nothing rather than something.
will definitely keep updateing as this may help someone else if they ever have similar problems.
One good thing is coming out of this - I'm learning a lot about colic in all it's forms and how to treat it.
 
From a liver point of view, milk thistle and low protein diet - had another one throw that at us too!

Colic has many many causes, very little is known as to why and the common treatment is buscapan, lunging and if that fails surgery which is as little invasiveness as possible! No real research is done, its quite depressing, the other thing is the recovery rates from surgery! How many horses aren't actually operated on for what ever reason = loads!

so no one really knows how to treat, the horse's gut is badly designed with 90 degree angles to negotiate and meters of colon! Thinking myself of putting a questionnaire together to see fi there is a correlation between surgery and worming and worm problems in horses, but it would be huge! We've suffered, lost and learnt, just hope you don't fall into our category and you can save your horse. It is distressing and it is a BIG problem. Sometimes I think (as does my friend) that if you could turn the horse upside down for just a few minutes and jig about a lot of the surgeries would be prevented - controversial and I'm not a vet, but putting in a lorry and transporting helps in some cases, rolling was not allowed and walking was a potential cure many years ago, now the treatments have changed, rectal, tube, tap, scan, operate - correct me if I'm wrong? Still willing to learn!

I just hope that the treatment works for your mare, and I genuinely hope that you find a solution. My concern is that the liver can be scanned (you don't have to do a biopsy to see swelling, lesions or to see if the bile ducts are blocked) and this is a relatively simple procedure, a biopsy is invasive and risky and not always necessary. Time, I think will be your enemy here (i hope to be very wrong!)

Lxx
 
Hi,

My mare was also VERY prone to colic..... Had her for 4 months then she collapsed in the field with it! Vets came, took her in and spoke about surgery! She was 4!! Thankfully she came though without surgery but then got colic very regularly....I also thought seasons as was almost every 3 weeks.... I found a supplement called GAS-EASE....Basically I thought I had nothing too lose so ordered some and yes she has had colic twice since I put her on it (6 months now and no colic for the last 15 weeks)but one of these "episodes" only lasted some 10 minutes so google it and see what you think (sorry no idea how to paste a web address)

PM me if you want to ask any questions about the GAS-EASE.....

Really hope you find a solution and know has worrying this can be
 
@madisonbelle. Thanks for the suggestion but it is not gas colic she is suffering from that is the 1 type of colic we do know that she isn't suffering from.
Ruby had ANOTHER colic attack this morning. Now there is a real pattern - Sunday, Wednesday, Sunday, Wednesday! Rang the vet and basically said enough is enough she needs to go the clinic today, this morning!
So, that's where she is at the minute.

Seems to be we just get her started back onto normal amounts of food, 2 /3 slices of hay in the net and a small amount of nuts mixed with the medicine and water and sweetened with a couple of sugar cubes so that she'll eat it and then the next day we start again with the colic.
Obviously she's lost quite a bit weight through this but not so much that she looks starved. This morning she also had no energy. Not surprising if she's not eating properly.

The clinic we've taken her to is specalised in colic cases and has all the latest technology available including a CT scanner. They took her blood and checked that first and surprisingly that came back normal. No more high counts for the liver. Then they gave her an injection to relax the bowel so the vet could feel it better. That was fun, NOT. Ruby hates injections and knows what a syringe looks like and starts to rear immediately on seeing it. She nearly came over the top of the examination box they had in her. Thought OMG, I'm going to have a horse with a broken leg AND colic problems. :eek:
Vet was really good with her, he took her out of the examination box immediately and perservered until he managed to inject her without upsetting her further.

Bowel was scanned and there were no abnormalities to be seen though the stomach did appear to be enlarged. We were there the whole time and the vet explained everything throughly as he scanned showing us what organs where were and what was bowel, spleen, lungs, liver and stomach.
Ruby is now being fasted (24 hours) as they want to check her stomach next and it needs to be empty for them to do that.
They will be looking for infection or ulcers.
Anyway she'll not be coming home until they can find something to explain these episodes of colic as this vet agrees that there is something not quite right.
Yard seems very empty without her. :(:(
Sorry for the essay but I'm keeping this up to date so if anyone else experiences this problem there is information available on symptoms and possible treatments and causes.
 
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Real feel for you - thinking of you & glad she's with the experts who'll be checking her all through the night. You have definitely done the right thing.
When I read your 1st post I thought ahha... I know another one, but having read on, I'm not so sure.
A horse on our yard is retired, lives out 24/7/365. She cribs for Britain on fence posts & all sorts of feeding regimes have been tried. She has Winergy Equilibrium now. However, in 2010 it was noticed that her colic episodes were every 3 weeks so Danilon was tried the day before a 'season' was anticipated and no colic followed. The same system was followed throughout 2011 with great success. Most of her episodes are minor enough that yard staff administering bute paste at 1st signs of colic is usually sufficient.
I'd definitely suggst that once she comes through all of this you try to find a low energy, low calorie, high fibre diet so that you can keep her intake of hay up without risking too much weight gain. Ensure good quality vitamin & mineral supplement or feed balancer meets all her needs.
Best of luck
 
Sorry to hear you've ended up at the clinic, however lets hope they can find some answers and that its something easy to treat!

Look forward to your update...
 
I hope things are going ok sounds like she's at the right place our mare that scared us to death with the unexplained colics turned out to have very nasty ulcers hope you get yours sorted soon.
 
YEEEEESSSSSSS!
They've found the reason she's been colicing. I shouldn't really be happy but I'm so pleased that they found an explanation so now we can begin the road to recovery.:) I was so worried that they would find something terrible.

They tried to scope the stomach this morning but there was still too much in the stomach for them to do it so they had to wait till this evening. Poor Ruby, she loves her food and she had nothing to eat for 36+ hours.:(
Anway, it worked. Her stomach was empty enough to be scoped and they apparently found some very nasty ulcers. They have begun to treat them and are keeping her for a few more days to make sure that she doesn't colic again once she has food back in her system.
Going to visit her on Saturday morning and will find out what they are treating the ulcers with. Now have lots of research to do to find out how to keep these in check and the best food/supplement to feed.
Will also start and put 2 nets in to make sure that she is never without hay. (Not that I didnt before but will now be extra vigilant). Never had a horse that suffered from ulcers. DDFT injuries, open wounds, broken hind leg and a orphan foal but never one with ulcers.
I wouldn't even class her a a stressy horse. She is very good natured and loves competitions. Typical nosey woman - likes a good look round and loves to show off.:p

Thought this thread would not end well at one point and yes, we still have a way to go but it will be great to eventually be able to post pictures of her competing in dressage again with my daughter.

Huge thanks for all the kind words and support and suggestions. I'll keep you updated how she's doing and when she comes home and add some photo's so that you can see what she looks like. If you can't wait, check out the grey mare in my profile.
 
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