Colitis

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orangepony

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Anyone had any experiences of colitis? Little mare was rushed to horse hospital late last night as an emergency, showing some similar symptoms to chronic grass sickness, however further tests seem to indicate colitis (awaiting bacterial cultures to determine further).

I have never experienced this before nor even really heard of it (plus Google has proven sufficiently terrifying!).

Any experiences welcome, and please cross fingers for my little trooper of a mare who was a dream patient last night despite clearly being in horrendous pain.
 
Hi
Firstly I hope your pony is ok. My mare has colitis which she had before I bought her. However she is extremely healthy and she shows very little signs as I now manage her condition by her diet. When I first got her she constantly had severe diarrhoea due to a low fibre diet, been given an endless supply of grass and was given codeine tablets by her previous owner. She is now feed Fast Fibre twice a day mixed with a large handful of Ossichaff and ad lib hay in her paddock. I also restrict her grass intake due to her high susceptibility to colic, by setting up a tracking system in her paddock which allows me to restrict her grass intake and encourages her to walk round. Before she goes on spring grass I give her a scoop of Protexin gut balancer to help firm up her pooh and settle her gut. Her pooh will never be normal but by give her plenty of fibre and restricting grass she leads a normal, healthy and happy life and no longer has diarrhoea. My vet is happy for her not to be medicate and is really pleased with her progress.
 
My mare had colitis. She was on box rest for about 6 weeks with no hay or grass - only short fibre like alfalfa, sugar beet and Dodson and Horrell Safe and Sound along with lots of psyllium. She had her colon scanned again and the inflammation and thickening had improved after 6 weeks box rest so I was able to gradually introduce grass. Hers was caused by larger amounts of Danilon that she was given for laminitis. She recovered fully and has never had it again. She currently has 1 bute a day for her arthritis but this has never been a problem. Can I ask what you were feeding?
 
Thank you all for your replies.

Mare is still in horsepital, seems to have rallied a little over the weekend and ate some hay, although appetite dropped off on the Sunday. She has since had a toxic laminitic episode, and now has a thromobosis in her neck from the catheter. We are now awaiting x-rays on the all 4 feet to determine any changes or rotations. The colitis was a very rapid onset- at 4pm she was completely fine, yet at 7.30pm she was rushed to horse hospital. Her diet to date has been Saracen Re-leve, speedi-beet, turmeric, mint and the occasional carrot; plus an adblib 50:50 offering of hay and haylage, with carefully managed restricted access (c.4hrs) to small area of grass (sown approx 18months ago so new to horses but equine specific blend).

I don't think they scanned her colon to start with but could be mistaken - I think the diagnosis was made from the toxic shock, excessive hosing, very high heart rate and fluctuating temperature with high protein levels. She also appeared to have issues swallowing either fluid or forage in the first six hours and re-fluxed on several occasions.

The ongoing management is what worries me, her diet is already very low in starches, high in fats and I am careful to minimise changes where possible. I should add she is a perfectly fit and healthy 5yo ISH, with no history of illness or gut issues and was remarkably stoical prior to admittance.

JanetGeorge, I will ask the vets about this - is it a specific GS related issue or one common to toxic colitis too?
 
My mare can suffer from bouts colitis although very mild compared to your girl.

For my mare, her trigger seems to be hayledge. I suspect she had had colitis for a long time as she always had loose poo but previous owners said she had always been like that, nothing sinister. She then started with diahorrea and pooing seemed painful I obviously got a Vet involved. Vet diagnosed mild colitis.

She can have the very odd treat of hayledge, but long term it is a huge no no. I was advised to take her off hayledge, put her onto hay, a year old if possible. No oils, garlic etc in feed as that can irritate things.

I have to say that touch wood with no hayledge she has been fine, gets the odd loose poo on grass (but they all do) and is out 24/7 in summer. I feed Alfa A, Oats and Ad Lib hay, she has shown no adverse effects to this at all, infact since putting her on this combo, nice firm poo all winter.

Touch wood, at first I had to manage her quite closely to get the colitis to clear up (I think she even had Antibiotics at the time to help clear it) but since I cut the hayledge I've been able to be wary what I feed but not worry too much about it.

Only relapse we had was a few weeks after diagnosis my YO at the time knowing my mare couldn't have hayledge put a bale of hayledge out in the field for them all to eat *Sigh*...
 
Finding the primary cause of the colitis will be really helpful.
Things on the list when my yearling had it were- encysted small redworm emergence (wormed on arrival, but had been on a good worming programme), bacterial infection (put on high dose of antibiotics after worming didn't help, it comes with risks) and toxins eg grass sickness. Unfortunately my yearling turned out to have cancer, diagnosed after a week (they opened her up) as she was unresponsive to other treatments.
I have everything crossed for you
 
My mare had Right Dorsal Colitis due to Danilon reaction. She spent a month in the clinic, another 3 months at home with me feeding her every 3 hours day and night as she couldn't have hay. We thought she was getting better but she started having regular colics again and we had her PTS. PM showed that scar tissue had adhered part of her gut to her sides; and also extreme thinning of the gut wall, so it was lucky she was PTS as she would have died from a rupture.

She is legendary in our vet clinic for the whole host of complications during her treatment. Not least because she had a fractured pedal bone so couldn't be turned out to grass either. (Edit - we had the thrombosis too!)

RDC is rare but very serious. The no hay thing is key but I found this out myself. US forums had more information than over here.

Does she have swelling along her belly? Protein levels were one of the key things my vets kept an eye on, and (memory is hazy on it now) the fluid in her belly was to do with them leaking out of her gut. Or something! If you search my user name you will probably find all my old posts. February to July 2011.
 
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