Laminitis...What are the first signs of recovery?

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Poppypie

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Hi all,
Last June we were lucky enough to get a little Exmoor for our children. He is totally gorgeous and we are all completely in love with him. Unfortunately he has laminitis at the moment and is on box rest. He is on half a sachet of bute morning and night (has been for 5 days so far) and is on a really deep bed. He now seems happy in himself and I am confident he is pain free but his feet are still warm. His digital pulse has very nearly gone as has some of the heat but I am worrying that his feet should be cooling down more than they have. Am I being unrealistic expecting them to be cool after five days?? The other thing is that it has been 24degrees for the last 3 days. Am I right in thinking this could be making his feet warmer than usual? Any thoughts/advice very gratefully received! Thank you!
Poppy
 
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My daughters pony had a very mild attack of lami about 3 weeks ago. She only needed 1 sachet of bute and after 2 days was back to her usual self. She only had a digital pulse for about 24hours and most of the heat had gone. She was on deep box rest for another week and then she went onto grass again for 1 hour a day. She trotted off across the field quite happily so I'm sure she was pain free. Now she is out for a couple of hours each day with a very small holed grazing muzzle and seems well.

I found the warm weather to be pretty awkward with checking her feet for heat. It's not that reliable and they can have heat in their feet and be perfectly well anyway.

Our pony also has cushings so her health & diet is managed very well so it was a surprise she came down with lami. Hopefully as we acted pretty quick she will be ok. Farrier is coming this week too.
 
The bute is probably making him more comfortable, you are doing the right thing keeping him in and off the grass. This weather will be a laminitis nightmare! Have you had the vet out? I wouldn't take the heat in the feet thing as meaning a lot in this weather and more so if he is in a deep bed. You could have been lucky and caught it early, have you found out what caused it? otherwise he is likely to come down with it again. Maybe get him out and walk him, turn him on a circle and see if he is still 'pottery'
 
My Shetland suffered laminitis , his feet still felt warm but he kind of let me know he was feeling better as he was walking around the stable more , I let him out for a five min wander on the yard and did this a few times,.
 
I found the most reliable signs are happy to move freely round the stable including looking happy when turning round and also no reluctance to pick up a foot. Its normal for feet to feel warm when the horse is warm so not surprised yours have heat with the high temperatures.
 
You need him off the painkillers to tell if he is improving because if he's not, and he's moving about he could be doing more damage.
Ideally, you should have xrays straightaway to make sure there is no rotation because until that is corrected (if there is any) it will be painful.

Have a read on here for some excellent info on how to manage laminitis
http://www.thelaminitissite.org
 
Pony needs to be off the painkillers a couple of days really, to see anything. But the Lami Clinics advice is 6-8weeks box rest for even the most 'mild' attack.
I wouldn't turn a pony back out on to grazing or walk it in hand until he had xrays - even on what people might class as a mild attack :)
 
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