Horse 2/10 lame but dangerous :(

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Alice_30

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For the past 4 months my horse has been extremely irritable, especially when ridden. He will buck as soon as you put your leg on and is very reluctant to go forward, this has become such an issue we cant even do a walking hack without him bronking. He is becoming dangerous. Got the vet out Friday as we suspected he had stomach ulcers only to be told he was 2/10 lame on his front left leg, to me 2/10 lame does not sound severe enough to cause this behaviour? The vet wants to explore this before we go the ulcer route.... has anyone got any advice??

Thanks xx
 
Ulcers are what jumped to mind when I read this, so I would personally push the vet to investigate this while giving the horse a break from work.
 
The lameness could definitely be causing the behavior. The severity of the lameness doesn't always correspond to the severity of the injury. A non-weight bearing horse may have an abscess which resolves itself and all is back to normal. 2/10ths lame could be a ligament, a tendon, the hock, the stifle, etc all of which are painful and would affect ridden behavior. Chronic pain puts everyone in a bad mood.

I'd deal with the problem you have found then re think about ulcers.
 
The lameness could definitely be causing the behavior. The severity of the lameness doesn't always correspond to the severity of the injury. A non-weight bearing horse may have an abscess which resolves itself and all is back to normal. 2/10ths lame could be a ligament, a tendon, the hock, the stifle, etc all of which are painful and would affect ridden behavior. Chronic pain puts everyone in a bad mood.

I'd deal with the problem you have found then re think about ulcers.
 
That's what the vet said, tackle this before we go down the ulcer route. regardless of whether he has ulcers he is still in pain with his leg. He has had both back suspensorys operated on already so i'm fearing the worst for his front leg. poor boy
Thanks for your opinions :)
 
If he's had his suspensorys done, is there any reason to suspect he has an issue with his sacro iliac? Mine was lame in front, which when a good person looked at his steps in walk we attributed to him walking odd behind - crossing one leg underneath himself and standing on the outside of the foot, making him appear lame. We have put this down to a problem in his SI so I'm now working on straightness training and getting a new saddle :)
 
When a vet judges the lameness ratio of a horse it is not just the lameness he is going by, i.e how significant the head nod is/visible lameness.

I queried this when my vet told me many years ago that my horse was 3/8ths lame and I asked him to explain in further detail as there was no way I'd have said he was or any of the people who had seen him on the lunge at the yard would have said he was! To us 3/8th lame would show a very evident head nod. And then he explained.....

...A vet will take into account the veterinary history of the horses lameness, evaluate it whilst its moving - in hand and on lunge possibly. A hands on examination to detect pain in hoof, joint (flexion test) or tendon (tendon test) and a hoof pincer test will take place. The vet will also look at the horse at rest to see how it stands, whether it is distributing its weight evenly, placing its limb correctly or whether its foot placement is not as it should be. Also the horses muscle tone will be taken into account as well as its shoeing (whether its feet are balanced) which will all give clues to the vet and this is then presented to the client in a grading which these days is usually in 1/8 ths rather than 10 ths, or at least it is with the vets I know around by us.

Therefore its my understanding that grading of 2/8 ths or 2/10th lame even, doesn't particularly mean the horse is limping with an evident lameness - even at this level it can be difficult to spot to the layman if the grading is made up of a few or many of the above criteria.
 
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