Long term prognosis of pelvic fractures...your experiences please

[freespirits]

Would be interested to hear from anyone that has had experience of pelvic fracture in the TB...what treatment was advised, if any other than rest/painkillers, and the long term effects.
I appreciate there are stress/hairline ones and then the more severe, but can horses go on to be ridden successfully without problems once healed...and what sort of time scale are we looking at?
Thanks

 

[TicTac]

Unfortunately for my horse he was PTS. He was also diagnosed at the same time with kissing spine and bone cycts to add to the list of problems he allready had. However before that decision was made the vet told me that to heal from his pelvic fracture he would need at least 8 months box rest. I purchsed the horse with an asymetrical pelvis so in hindsight, I guess he had allready suffered a previous injury.

I think it depends on what you want to do but on the whole, the return to competitve work is guarded and probably at best general hacking.

 

[Penniless]

Don't be disheartened because many TB racers suffer from pelvis fractures and go on to win races - I can speak from experience from my own horses. One did spend about four or five months resting but went on to get into the winners enclosure more times than he did before his break!

He has now been retired a few years, but has another successful career in acting as a lead horse for many trainers during the years in and around Newmarket. He has never shown any signs of lameness since his break.

I do at present have a TB broodmare who not only broke her pelvis but smashed her hip bone totally on Christmas Day last year. She actually was allowed out of her box only a couple of days ago, and at the moment she still seems a bit uncoordinated, but that might just be the fact of how long she's been in the small stable for. We have though been advised by our stud vet, to call them the minute the mares waters break as she will probably need more assistance than we are qualified to do for a healthy foaling. The foal is due in a couple of weeks time but we are hoping that she does her normal thing, and go well overdue to give her more time to repair.

As for pain killers etc, just bute for a week and that was it. Good luck with yours.

 

[Auslander]

Not a TB, but my horse fractured his pelvis as a yearling, and apart from noticeably uneven muscular development over his quarters, he was absolutely fine. I didn't start him til he was nearly 7 as he was very gangly and weak, but he was 100% sound behind from day 1. He was a big old beastie, weighing in at over 800kg, so any weakness would have been exacerbated by having to carry himself around. He had big, flamboyant warmblood paces and could sit behind for the advanced dressage movements with no problem. Never gave the pelvis a thought, except when I was pulling his tail and looking at his mismatched hindquarters.
Long term, I guess arthritis could have set in, but I lost him last year at 13 - so I guess I'll never know...

 

[stacie21]

we had one at work that came in as they found it in stable it had broke its pelvis and bone came through skin did not think she would make it had op and box rest then we started her walking she went on to race again apart from the scar and being uneven was fine unfortunately has fractured knee now so think she going to recover and be a mummy but they say that were a break was its the strongest part its the bits around it that tend to fail