Laminitis or Navicular?

F

FeatherPower

Well-Known Member
Joined
26 June 2009
Messages
251
Visit site
Hello!

I am looking after a horse that we thought was suffering from laminitis. After a month of treatment and prevention including proper grazing and feeding (for a lami prone horse) the horse better, but is still not right.

The thing that has confused me is that the horse has not 'foundered' i.e leant back on heels to take weight off toes - rather the horse leans forward onto toes as if trying to remove weight from heels- which sounds more like a navicular type symptom? She also shifts her weight alot from one back foot to the other as well as leaning forward

Does anyone have any thoughts? Can laminitis be a cause or irritant to navicular type syndrome? She has had Laminitis before from what I have been told.
 
what says she hasnt got navicular and has a bout of laminitis, it is possible!!!

Leaning forwards with weight onto the toe is definatly a sign of navicular, whats the farrier said, he will see strecthing of the laminae, if the horse had laminitis, If not I would see about getting hte farrier to test for navicular.

Lou x
 
I did wonder that - poor girl I hope not both!

The weird thing is the farrier (who is new to my lad and myself) said that there was nothing wrong with her other than a raised digital pulse and definitely not laminitis! I ignored that comment as was almost certain lami as she could barely walk and went down in the field - we brought her in and she has been on prepared hay (so not starved but the right stuff for lami)

She definitely improved having been treated for lami (ie she can walk, stand and move around now, even put a double barrel in at a new pony!) but its this leaning forward thing that is all wrong.

Are egg bars (spelling?) a good first step?
 
I look after a pony like this, where he avoids putting weight on an inside heel. He had bad laminitis nearly 2 years ago. Although no pedal bone rotation he had a massive heel abscess in his right fore. He's never been 100% sound on it since but he returned to work for a bit. It comes and goes to some extent. He nerve blocks sound in the foot but not around the navicular area. The vets have no idea. We're at the stage where we just accept he's not sound, we've just got to decide what to do with him.
frown.gif
 
Was the abscess found by the vet/farrier or did it blow out?

Thats a good point actually - my old girl had lamitis and then a few months later had an abscess which I assumed were linked (ccombined with her old age had slow hoof growth) and she was very poorly from this infection.

Ok this is all really really helpful - please keep your thoughts coming!
 
Farrier suspected an abscess but the vet had to come to dig more out. It was massive and all we can think is that it left some lasting damage in the foot.
 
The horse is clearly in pain.
Why are you asking the farrier and not a vet. A farrier is not trained or allowed to provide a diagnoisis. Get a specialist equine vet in and get x rays taken to determine exactly what is going on. That way you will get a diagnsis a be able to treat the horse correctly.
 
sigh -

As mentioned in the OP the horse is not mine - I am simply trying to help out having had experience with laminitis before. I presume the vet has been due to the bute that she is on and not really my place to bring a vet out to a horse that is not mine, hence why asking a question on here to gather enough information to pass to the owners and encourage them to take further action.

The farrier was here trimming my lad and I over heard their conversation, it was after this I offered to help out if lami.

From my understanding navicular is very difficult to diagnose / over diagnosed and certainly cannot be done from x ray alone?
 
" From my understanding navicular is very difficult to diagnose / over diagnosed and certainly cannot be done from x ray alone?"


Have been having 6 months of this, my horse was leaning forward, short striding and shifting weight. Vet diagnosed "navicular syndrome" which I feel is a bit of a cop out. Xrays didnt show any changes to the bone and nerve blocks confined it to the hoof. Various treatments havent helped so have just turned him away for a year but... he did have collapsed heels / flat feet so this may be the cause of the pain and we are slowly addressing this with remedial farriery. The next step as far as vet was concerned was MRI scan to see what else going on but he felt there wasnt much else that could be done and a downward slope really..... :-( I suspect soft tissue damage from poor conformation, maybe my boy wil lcome right maybe he wont....

Vets and farriers need to work together and sometimes a good farrier will know about feet than a vet....... Anyway perhaps my advice would be to get the vet to xray and nerve block. They will give a starting point and even if they dont show any problems the farrier will use them to help shoe appropriately, whether egg bars etc ..

Hope that helps
 
My older horse might be a good example?

He was turned away barefoot for a few months while recuperating from a front ligament strain. This was mid-summer when the ground was hard. Over a period of a couple of days I noticed him becoming increasingly sore on his front feet and he started to take a laminitic stance.

Despite being a really low lami risk horse I immediately treated as laminitis. As it turned out it was boarderline concussive laminitis - farrier said no laminitic changes and vet said basically a posh name for very footsore!

So a fortnight of deep bedding, bute, acp and shoes back on and horsey was looking much better. Fast forward a couple of months and horse back in work - he very quickly went lame and was diagnosed navicular syndrome.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top