Deep digital flexor tendon - injury in hoof....

Marnie

Marnie

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I am sure I have seen at least one post about this, but can't remember when or who!

My youngster out on loan has been tentatively diagnosed with this, she blocks out sound in the heel area, and the tendon looks slightly enlarged on scan as it goes into the foot when compared to her other leg. She is having egg bars fitted and is on a 4 week programme of box rest with controlled walking exercise for 4 weeks after she will be reassessed. If still lame at that point, we will look at doing MRI.

Anyone any experience of this? Likely prognosis?

Thanks!
 
Silmarillion and Jet_Set, off the top of my head are the people to ask. Im sure that Star would be able to help too as she has had lots of tendon probs with her ned, and she is the forum vet too! Thinking on, H's mum, half-step ... so many. Hope you get results.
 
One of mine had a small tear to the DDFT amongst other things, and after the usual rest, and in our case, going barefoot, she came back to full soundness within a year.

I did a bit of research at the time and found an empirical study of DDFT injuries which looked at many horses and the outcomes. The general picture was that 1 in 5 returned to competition. The prognosis is quite poor if it is a bad tear. Only an MRI can really tell you what you're dealing with if it's at the base of the DDFT.
 
My young Connie was finally diagnosed with a severe injury to the DDFT after an MRI scan - the vets could not even allow him to be retired as he was in so much pain, so I had to take the hearbreaking decision to have him pts.

Your youngster sounds as though the injury is no where near as severe, and I will keep everything crossed for a happy outcome for you.xx
 
Were these injuries actually in the foot? Is damage to the tendon worse in the foot than on the leg (if that makes sense!!)? Have you used any other treatment e.g. adequan or physio?

Thank you for sharing your experiences, gives me more of an idea what I am dealing with.
 
Mine was MRI'd recent and had injury to DDFT (and DSIL) in the hoof. Not a tear as such but swelling.

We are in month 2 of 3 months box rest so too early to say what will happen to him long term.
Vet has given us a 60% chance of coming back to full function.

Mine is on MSM and Glucosamine as prescribed by the Vet and i am feeding Tendoneaze and Pernamax which were recommended by various people.

He is shod to support the heels but not special shoes as such, more about how the foot is trimmed and the shoe fitted.
He also has carbon fibre heels supports which have been developed by the farrier at the RVC.
 
Mine tore a 2cm hole in her DDFT in her left fore, right below and along her navicular bone. She also had degeneration of the cartilage around the pedal bone. This was diagnosed after MRI (vet had settled on "navicular syndrome" but was happy to do a more detailed diagnosis by MRI). She was given a 20-25% chance of return to full ridden work. She was a riding club all-rounder, and after four and a half months of box rest and 14 months of field rest, she came very slowly back into work this summer. She has done two months of in-hand walking, then had front shoes put on (special ones spun inside-out) and has done a month of walking under saddle so far. She is as sound as she ever was and is loving going out, but she will never do anything but hack again (not allowed to turn left sharply/circle too much!) I am just thrilled to have my horse back under saddle and enjoying life, after my vet diagnosed her and told me to give in and shoot her (cut my losses!!)
Prognoses for DDFTs are worse than SDFTs, and generally require at least a year to 18 months bumming around in a field (horse doing its own light walk work) to heal properly. I assume you've missed the inital two weeks after the injury? Cold therapy is very much recommended for this period - I missed it and I always wonder if mine would have been better now if I hadn't. She's not doing badly though, and I certainly know a couple of horses with DDFT injuries back jumping again. Listen to your vet but also do your own research!
 
Interesting what you say about the first two weeks - we absolutely picked up lameness but were misdiagnosed by first vet as laminitis and farrier as bruised sole.

We did do some hosing but also some unnecessary poulticing and digging out of the hoof until we got a tentative diagnosis by my current vet of soft tissue damage in the foot.

We didn't do box rest at that stage but gentle exercise until we were finally confirmed by MRI.

What the vet did say to me is these injuries are very unpredicable - he's seen horrendous tears where you think they will never walk again come back into full work. Others that have slight damage never come sound again so in that sense statistics mean nothing.

All we can do is keep our fingers crossed that we are among the lucky ones whose horse have a job they can do (whatever it is ) at the end.

I just count my blessings that my young ex racer TB is calm and sane during the box rest and it makes me hope even more he will come right.

I do find in helpful though talking on these forums to other people who are going through the same.
 
My horse tore both DDFT in Sept 04. Was on box rest for 6mnths thn very slowly brought back into work. He's just finished his 1st season eventing at PN. With the right care the prognosis can be very good.
 
Hi we are going through similiar at the moment.
Nerve blocks showed soft tissue damage in the foot.Xrays of the hoof came back sound so vet recommended bar shoes with gels pads.After nerve blocking he still showed lameness so we did another scan (he had scans and xrays july)and he has 50 % tear of proximal sdft (this is higher up towards the knee).Havent started treatment yet as insurance company are not being very helpful.
I think he must have done tendon tear around sept I had the vet out who said it was mild and I was treating for splint so he had support and was restricted but went back into full size paddock in Oct as the splint had healed.Im waiting for my vet to get back to me but we could update on progress if you like as hoof problems sound very similiar.
 
Thanks to everyone for their experiences, it is really helpful to 'talk' to others going through similar, I would be very interested to hear any updates too!

I have my claim form now, so just about to sort that out!

Thanks again - BTW, Muppet the suffering one, is the horse in the middle of my signature. The other mare is the one currently on 3 months rest for pelvis problems!
 
my boy had a suspected DDFT injury in hoof and was on box rest for 3 months and then controlled exercise etc and he came back to full work and did lots of dressage and a bit of eventing that was two years ago and he's been fine since so chin up i think it depends on severity but i couldn;t afford to have MRI etc done so i think rest is the best option good luck
 
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