Liver damaged pony

[DaisyOscar]

Ok so just before Christmas my 26 yr old 14.2h was diagnosed with liver damage. He had went off his food for a day or 2 and had lost weight.
My vet took blood samples and said that his liver was damaged, and he was anaemic. I was told he would waste away so was strongly considering putting him to sleep.

I decided to try giving Milk Thistle as a supplement as well as an iron supplement from Horse first via syringe and he began to pick up. His appetite gradually came back and he began eating grass and small amounts of pony cubes.

At the moment he is eating Horse and pony cubes, Speedibeet, cooked flaked maize and Just Grass by Dodson &Horrell, as much as he will eat, several times a day.

He is out grazing all day and is brought in at night and gets haylage. I'm still giving him the Milk Thistle tincture, and B-well. He was always a very fussy eater so would never eat much haylage before but has started eating more now?

He is perky and can't wait to get out to the field in the morning and will buck and give a little skip for joy sometimes. He is still thin though, and it is very frustrating as I can't give him any conditioning or oily feed.

Has anyone else any good experience of a liver damaged horse? Is there anything else I can do to help him put on weight?

He is only on the Just grass and flaked maize recently as I have read they are good for liver damaged horses as they are comparitively low in protein but are good for weight gain?

Obviously if he deteriorates at all I will put him to sleep, but he seems so full of life and happy now that I want to try my best to get him up to good condition again. Before he went off his feed he was looking the best he had ever looked. He had no other symptoms of liver failure other than loss of appetite.

Long and rambling sorry!

 

[Box_Of_Frogs]

Do a search on my posts hun - tons of info on liver damaged horses.

How well your pony does really depends on what has caused the liver damage and his general health otherwise. Bear in mind a horse's immune system gets less effective the older he gets. If the liver damage has been caused by an infection of some sort, then the liver can regenerate its function and all will (eventually) be well. If it's caused by ragwort poisoning, then the outlook is less encouraging. Ragwort damaged livers cannot regenerate. And bear in mind too that the outward signs and symptoms of liver damage only tend to show when the liver is 70% damaged. Sadly, the only way to know what has caused the damage is to take a biopsy, which itself can be dicey with liver damage as it will affect blood clotting.

Here's how to support a damaged liver while you and your vets work out what to do and watch for other sypmptoms, changes in symptoms or improvement:

1. Feed a very low protein diet - it's less work for the liver
2. But all animals need SOME protein so the protein you do feed should be top quality
3. Don't ever feed conditioning mixes as they contain oil which the liver can't metabolise
4. Keep up with the Milk Thistle - it really does aid damaged livers
5. Feed Yea Sac as it aids hind gut digestion which is often compromised with liver damage
6. Feed little and often - again, less work for the liver
7. Keep out of the summer sun as horrific photo sensitivity can occur

I took on a rescued gipsy cob that had dreadful ragwort poisoning. We pulled her back from the brink with top notch advice direct from Prof Derek Knottenbelt and D&H. Part of her recovery was due to her only being 12yrs old and never having known an ounce of luxury in her entire life, so she was truly as hard as nails. She survived and now you wouldn't know she had ever been ill. She still only has about 30% of her liver function left but it's enough for her to live a more or less normal life, as long as 1-7 above are followed. A less robust, or much older horse might not be so lucky.

Symptoms to watch out for include loss of weight, loss of appetite, lethargy, loss of interest in life, jaundice, terrible sun burn, bloated abdomen, poor blood clotting, standing in corners with head pressed against the wall and - at the end - blindness, staggering, strange calling, self harm and harm to the owner.

I'd recommend that you adopt the above feeding regime immediately, talk with your vets about what the blood results mean, watch your pony carefully for improvement or deterioration. If he starts to deteriorate or shows distressing end stage symptoms, then you need to be brave for him. Fingers crossed it's reversible x