Driving myself slightly mad and need to vent!

[EternalVetBills]

Sorry for the delayed update everyone!

It's been slightly maddening trying to sort anything out for treatment wise.

So long story short, my lovely vet came out after my last post. We could not find anything at all, no lameness, no soreness, absolutely nothing!

Vet suggested a bute trial for a couple of weeks and see how she goes. Bute made absolutely no difference whatsoever. Vet then came back out and we could see just a smidge of lameness on her right hind, this was enough to convince the insurance to give pre-approval for a bone scan.

So that's where my lovely girl is currently, at the vets having a bone scan. I dropped her off last night and she's due to have her scan at 8 this morning ?.

My vets current theory is that she's possibly broken a rib or done something to her pelvis, but we obviously won't know for sure until later. I will make sure I update everyone when I hear ?

 

[Hannahgb]

Fingers crossed for the scan today, that you get some idea but its nothing major x

 

[Surbie]

Fingers crossed for a decent amount of information to come from the scans. It must be so frustrating not to know where this is coming from. I also hope you can find a place with a decent arena surface.

 

[holeymoley]

Hopefully you get some answers today. They’re a big heavy animal to slip and come down without doing any damage. I feel your pain with rubbish school, I have one too but far too deep and uneven. YO thinks it’s fabulous.

 

[Alibear]

Fingers crossed that you get some useful results back and its something easily sorted.

 

[Birker2020]

Fingers crossed for your mare x

 

[EternalVetBills]

Thank you all!

Just had a call from the vet nurse that did her scan and it all went well. She's back in her stable waking up now. I should hopefully hear the results either later on today or early tomorrow morning ?

 

[alibali]

Fingers crossed for a positive outcome for you

 

[EternalVetBills]

Okay so they found some things, unfortunately. Some related to the fall, some not.

A small spinal fracture, and an injury to her hock (we won't be 100% what sort of injury until we do further investigations), both related (we think) to the fall.

They have also found some quite severe kissing spines, she's never shown any symptoms of this before now, however the vet feels that the fall has possibly jarred something that's been brewing for awhile, and she also has some spondylitis.

She's having further investigations done tomorrow whilst she's still at the hospital, so we won't know anything for definite until then, but it's looking most likely that she will need to be retired ?.

I will keep everyone updated as and when I know more

 

[ycbm]

Sorry that wasn't better news for you

 

[EternalVetBills]

Sorry that wasn't better news for you

TBH, as sad as I feel that I most likely won't be able to ride her again, I'm just happy that she should be able to come home and live a happy life out in a field being fat. She was a broodmare her whole life until I had her and has then been the best little dressage diva for me these last couple of years, so definitely deserves a nice retirement.

I'm also grateful in a way for the fall as, like I say, the vet feels it brought to light things that may not have been noticed for another couple of years. So hopefully we can treat them now and she can retire before they become big problems

 

[LadyGascoyne]

TBH, as sad as I feel that I most likely won't be able to ride her again, I'm just happy that she should be able to come home and live a happy life out in a field being fat. She was a broodmare her whole life until I had her and has then been the best little dressage diva for me these last couple of years, so definitely deserves a nice retirement.

I'm also grateful in a way for the fall as, like I say, the vet feels it brought to light things that may not have been noticed for another couple of years. So hopefully we can treat them now and she can retire before they become big problems

You sound like such a lovely owner, she’s lucky to have you.

I hope she feels better soon.

 

[spotty_pony]

Ahh poor you - sorry I haven’t read all of the replies. Sounds like whatever happened when she fell has set something off, although behaviour is very typical of ulcers too so scoping may be a good starting point, as would be referral to a physio as it may just be something as simple as a she has knocked something out of place with the fall. You do not need a school for a lameness work up - as long as you have somewhere dry and flat on grass to lunge on and a hard flat surface for trotting up/lungeing on the hard then that will be done.

 

[Dave's Mam]

Oh sorry it's been rubbish news. Big hug.

 

[alibali]

What a lucky girl to have such a great owner, not only picking up on her discomfort but acting on it rather than ignoring it. I'm sorry it wasn't better news for you. Hugs

 

[SEL]

Okay so they found some things, unfortunately. Some related to the fall, some not.

A small spinal fracture, and an injury to her hock (we won't be 100% what sort of injury until we do further investigations), both related (we think) to the fall.

They have also found some quite severe kissing spines, she's never shown any symptoms of this before now, however the vet feels that the fall has possibly jarred something that's been brewing for awhile, and she also has some spondylitis.

She's having further investigations done tomorrow whilst she's still at the hospital, so we won't know anything for definite until then, but it's looking most likely that she will need to be retired ?.

I will keep everyone updated as and when I know more

I am sorry. It does make you realise how stoic they are xx

 

[EternalVetBills]

I am sorry. It does make you realise how stoic they are xx

Absolutely! You never would have know anything was wrong with her back, she never so much as flinched when we felt it. And it was only a couple of weeks ago that she actually went lame, so it wasn't until it must've gotten really bad that she showed anything outwardly.
Feeling slightly guilty as although I'm not exactly heavy, I'm no dainty little fairy either ?. Very, very proud of her for being such a good girl, after today's unfoldings I would've totally understood if she'd decked me multiple times. Just shows what kind animals they are

 

[Surbie]

TBH, as sad as I feel that I most likely won't be able to ride her again, I'm just happy that she should be able to come home and live a happy life out in a field being fat. She was a broodmare her whole life until I had her and has then been the best little dressage diva for me these last couple of years, so definitely deserves a nice retirement.

I'm also grateful in a way for the fall as, like I say, the vet feels it brought to light things that may not have been noticed for another couple of years. So hopefully we can treat them now and she can retire before they become big problems

She's a very lucky girl, and it's so nice that you see it that way. Plus well done on pushing through with the vet when she had such mild symptoms.

 

[EternalVetBills]

She's a very lucky girl, and it's so nice that you see it that way. Plus well done on pushing through with the vet when she had such mild symptoms.

Thank you, I am very lucky with my vet fortunately. She knows my mare almost as well as I do, and even though we couldn't actually see anything, we could tell *something* wasn't right. It was just a matter of trying to get anything to show up lameness wise so we could convince the insurance that the bone scan was worthwhile, thankfully with a couple more weeks of riding she went lame enough that we could justify it, I just felt very guilty those couple of weeks riding a horse with a suspected broken rib ??

 

[Melody Grey]

Sorry it wasn’t better news. That’s a lot to take in. Take some time to think through and talk through with vets and your other professionals. Some time will hopefully give you a clearer idea of how to proceed.
Wishing you a good outcome x

 

[Melody Grey]

May I be totally uncouth and ask you how much your bone scan has cost? I have a mystery lameness going on with OH’s cob and I’m wondering whether it might give us answers on we’ve exhausted current lines of enquiry?

 

[EternalVetBills]

May I be totally uncouth and ask you how much your bone scan has cost? I have a mystery lameness going on with OH’s cob and I’m wondering whether it might give us answers on we’ve exhausted current lines of enquiry?

I don't think that's uncouth at all! It was £1500, which I didn't think was bad at all considering all of x-rays she would've had to have otherwise. It's the second horse I've had that's had one now, and I would highly recommend it. Both times it has shown up areas that multiple different vets hadn't thought to look at beforehand, and has completely changed our treatment plans moving forward.
When my last horse had his bone scan, it took us from thinking of having him pts, to aiming to go back out competing! Sadly he start having fits soon after he got back into proper work, but that was completely unrelated.
I do think they are very worthwhile if your insurance will pay for it/you can fund it yourself.

 

[Melody Grey]

I don't think that's uncouth at all! It was £1500, which I didn't think was bad at all considering all of x-rays she would've had to have otherwise. It's the second horse I've had that's had one now, and I would highly recommend it. Both times it has shown up areas that multiple different vets hadn't thought to look at beforehand, and has completely changed our treatment plans moving forward.
When my last horse had his bone scan, it took us from thinking of having him pts, to aiming to go back out competing! Sadly he start having fits soon after he got back into proper work, but that was completely unrelated.
I do think they are very worthwhile if your insurance will pay for it/you can fund it yourself.

Thankyou- that’s really helpful to know. Glad it’s been a worthwhile diagnostic tool for you. Struggling to know where to look next with this horse, so this could well be a good line of enquiry if the current plan doesn’t solve anything.

 

[EternalVetBills]

Sorry for the slightly delayed update everyone, we've not really know what was going on until today.

So after her bone scan on Tuesday, on Wednesday she then had x-rays of her neck, back, pelvis, and hocks, and an MRI of her right hock. I then met up with my normal vet at the the hospital and we talked through the findings with the surgeon.
She has a small fracture on one of the vertebrae in her withers and another one just underneath her saddle area. She has kissing spines which are nearly completely fused along the top of her withers and then another patch underneath her saddle area, both the tops and bottoms of the vertebrae have bony spurs growing in this patch.
She's got arthritic changes in both hocks, with the right showing more heat than the left. The surgeon felt this was probably to do with the fall as she fell on her right side. Nothing new showed up on the MRI thankfully!
She also had some uptake on the bone scan in her sacriliac area, but we don't know whether or not this is a secondary issue yet.

There are options for treatment, however, after discussing it at length (seriously he cancelled his next appointment ?) we've decided against anything other than basic steroid injections and something called meso therapy (I think I've spelt that right) just to make her comfortable. She's obviously had the kissing spines for awhile and just carried on like the good girl she is and it's just unfortunate that the fall has exasperated everything, but there have been little niggly problems (never anything major just the occasional wrong canter lead, or taking awhile to warm up) that always disappeared when she was fit. So I would assume she's always been in some pain but I've just put it down to weakness when she's been out of work. Where she has kissing spines is very rare (because of course it would be ?) and treatment options are limited and not guaranteed to work as the steroids can't get in far enough. Both my vet and the surgeon feel that in hand work would still be very beneficial to her in the long term, both mentally and physically, so are going to chat to my physio and we'll come up with a light work plan.
There is talk that maybe in 6 months time or so that she *might* be well enough for me to hop on once maybe twice a week for a small stroll round the block, but both advised that she should never come back to a full workload. TBH, I don't know whether I would as she is so stoic I would hate for her to be in pain and not tell me. She'll also be on Prevacox every day for the rest of her life too.

So it's not all awful, still very sad obviously and I feel for my poor old girl who has just been such a saint for however long she's had this going on. Always scoring in the mid to high 70% even when we stepped up a level, always giving her all to everything. It's one of those horrible situations where I can 100% see all of the signs looking back, but I, and my very extensive team of physios, vets, instructors, ect, never really picked up on any of it because she was so quiet about it all. Just keep thinking what a lovely kind mare she is