Intermittent swollen eyelids

[Micawber]

A couple of weeks back our NF pony suddenly developed a swollen upper eyelid which spread to a general swelling of both upper and lower lids within a few hours. The eye remained clear and there was no discharge. As the pony is new to us (had her just over a month - passed 5* vetting no probs) I thought I'd call the vet for a look see. After checking both eyes, temp, general condition etc (everything else normal)his diagnosis was vague - could be allergy, dust from straw bedding, hay, stress of moving yards ...usual stuff ...but he did not seem concerned and left a couple tubes Opticlox ointment.

The eyelids returned to normal overnight after applying the ointment but we continued for a few days during which the eyelids of the other eye came up but again quickly returned to normal after the ointment treatment.

All has been well since but we've been bathing both eyes with cold tea once a day. However yesterday the eyelids on the original eye are puffy again although nothing in the way of environment, routine or feeding has changed nor is there evidence of her having injured herself.

Spoke to previous owner this morning and she says that in the 2.5 years she had her the eyelid had only swollen twice but it was months apart. She put it down to the animal having rubbed itself or something and as it quickly returned to normal she never called her vet.

I'm going to speak to our vet again tomorrow but would be interested to hear any comments from anyone who has encountered something similar.

 

[Fransurrey]

I have a similar problem with my old shetland. Any dirt at all in his eye and BAM! Conjunctivitis. It's a constant nightmare, as the flies irritate them in the summer (but he won't keep a mask or fringe on!) and the wind gets them in the winter! I keep the inflammation down to a minimum by bathing them every single day and every so often he has a course of chloramphenicol, when it's quite bad. The vet checked for ulcers and the like and found nothing. I do know he likes to rub his head, which definitely makes it worse! How old is he? My boy is ancient and in his case the problem started a couple of years ago, we can only suppose due to blocked tear ducts.

 

[Birker2020]

I was interested to hear your last sentence about your horses assumed blocked tear ducts. Our beagle bitch had a weepy eye so we took her to the vets and she put a strip of paper with dye against her eye ball and told us to wait for ten minutes. If the tear duct was blocked you would not see any dye come out of her nostril. We waited with baited breath but there was a drop of green dye coming out of both nostrils (she looked very strange) so the vet thought she had just got a bit of cold in her eye and gave us eye drops. Would they not be able to do that test with horses?

 

[Orangehorse]

The tear duct idea is a good one. Otherwise is sounds as though there might be something in his new environment that is giving an allergic reaction? Don't know, just a random thought.

 

[Box_Of_Frogs]

Sunny had the fluoroscene test to check if his tear ducts were open. They just dribble the green dye into the eye and you wait for it to dribble out of the nose. It dribbled out of Sunny's nose on his "good" eye side almost immediatle but took 40 mins before a teeny drop appeared on his "bad" eye side. Blocked tear ducts though can be the CAUSE of a problem or the END RESULT of a different problem! We will never know if Sunny had a partly blocked tear duct on one side because of poor tear production in that eye or whether the partly blocked tear duct CAUSED the poor tear production!

Difficult one. It could be as simple as the pony in a new environment leaning to look at something or scratching on something or it could be an allergy. However, it could also be the start of something much worse so I would watch it like a hawk and if you are in any doubt whatsoever, ask for a referral to a specialist eye vet. Eyes are so very fragile and so very precious.

 

[kellyeaton]

in stead of cleaning the eye with cold tea three is a product from your local health shop made for swallon infected sore eyes etc it is a herb called eye bright!