How A Horse With A Rare Broken Leg Returned To Winning Ways

[Elf On A Shelf]

If you hop over to the Lucind Russell Racing Facebook page there's a post just gone up about the injury, recovery and success of Well Above Par. He fractured his leg in a very rare way - horizontally. Normally this would mean pts but because the fracture wasn't complete - by mere MM! - he was able to be fixed and made a winning return to racing. Well Above isn't a little horse either - he is a good 17.2hh of sheer ignorance at times ?? but we love him!

The post contains pics of the x-rays for those who are interested!

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=3989799061065891&id=413668735345626&sfnsn=scwspmo

 

[millikins]

Congratulations, pleased he had a happy ending. Out of interest, why don't they pin and plate?

 

[Elf On A Shelf]

Congratulations, pleased he had a happy ending. Out of interest, why don't they pin and plate?

We normally pin where possible, I will find some x-rays of that in a tick, but being a horizontal fracture just above the fetlock joint you couldn't pin or plate it. You just had to wrap it up and pray! It's a good job he is generally a docile horse who doesn't do airs Above the ground else the fracture may well have completed and that would have been curtains.

 

[Elf On A Shelf]

Different horse. You can see the crack coming up from the bottom of the bone, curving up to almost the side. It didn't quite break off completely, again mm held it in place.


2 screws were needed and if you think it's done with super high-tech fancy smancy vet tools you will be disappointed to find out that it is done with a big standard black and decker drill with a constant stream of saline going over it ??

 

[millikins]

Thanks for the info. In humans orthopaedic surgeons tend to be looked down on by their fellow surgeons on the basis that orthopaedics is essentially carpentry with blood involved

 

[Elf On A Shelf]

Thanks for the info. In humans orthopaedic surgeons tend to be looked down on by their fellow surgeons on the basis that orthopaedics is essentially carpentry with blood involved

Thats a brilliant way of looking at it ??

 

[HorseMaid]

I can second that - I work in theatres and orthopedics is drills, hammers and saws! But nice to see those same methods being used on equines, I didn't even know that this was a thing for certain fractures in horses

 

[brighteyes]

Different horse. You can see the crack coming up from the bottom of the bone, curving up to almost the side. It didn't quite break off completely, again mm held it in place.
View attachment 68958

2 screws were needed and if you think it's done with super high-tech fancy smancy vet tools you will be disappointed to find out that it is done with a big standard black and decker drill with a constant stream of saline going over it ??

View attachment 68959

And hardware from Screwfix...

 

[LadyGascoyne]

Amazing. Lucky horse to be somewhere where the injury was picked up so quickly.

 

[Jeni the dragon]

Lucky boy! And amazing to see him winning!