Mare with potential ulcers, help please?

[CowCob]

I'm convinced MooCob has stomach ulcers, she's always been a bit fighty and cheeky, but now she's getting dangerous. But it's not naughty, she's not the type of horse for that. Well, long story short, I was almost knocked unconscious the other day from her rearing very, very high. Before anyone asks about back and teeth, she had her teeth done last month, back was done last month, saddle was done a couple months back. None of which had any kind of twinge wrong.

She's a total doll on the ground and is practically a 500kg dog. It's when you put leg on her ridden that the problems start, head goes up, ears flicker, tail swishes, bucking into canter then go round lovely for a bit (as leg has been taken off) then as you guide her round the corner with your leg she'll slam on the breaks and rear.

Hopefully the vet will be out to scope her in the next few days (I'll probably end up posting some kind of update about it). Few questions tho if she does have them:

1) Will she need to be off work for x amount of time for them to heal?

2) How long did it take for your neddies to get back to the norm?

3) How much did your full treatment cost?

4) How does claiming on insurance work? Do I pay all and finish treatment then claim or does the bill go through them on going?

5) What is the best supplement for after care? I heard something about rebalancing the hindgut?

Sorry if this sounds dim or rambled I'm a bit stressed out over it and never had a horse with ulcers.

 

[YasandCrystal]

I have experience of 2 with ulcers. The first my WB was behaving very aggressively and dangerously on the ground and ridden. He was scoped and found to only have 2 grade 2 ulcers, one in the gut and one in the pyloric region. He was turned away on gastrogard daily for a month on an adlib forage diet. We knew that his ulcers were symptomatic of a more serious lameness and he was diagnosed with chronic sacro iliac dysfunction. It has taken 18 months of turn away and a further year of rehab to get him back ridden. He lives out 24/7 and has a fibre diet and adlib forage. He also is always on a gut supplement such as Feedmarks Gastric Aid or Settlex. I have recently bough Equinox and he gets linseed as he has turmeric for his health.

My second case is my Dales youngster with whom I did loads of inhand balancing work before backing with my trainer but he always remained tense in his barrel. He never moved freely forward, was very upright and reactive to the leg and whip via bucking, kicking. She suspected ulcers finally, but it took us a long time to conclude that with him being a native type and living out with the WB 24/7 with a similar diet. He did have an accident at 3 years old though where he got his headcollar caught on a stable door and pulled back dramatically. I believe this was trauma enough to cause ulcers. I simply bought Gastro plus from Abler direct and treated him for 6 weeks. I then did a detox regime for a further 6 weeks with green clay and chlorella to resestablish the hindgut good bacteria (did this with the WB too). He too is now on a gut supplement. He is a changed horse - no longer reactive to the whip, he is softer in his barrel and relaxed. Incredible change.

To me the important thing is to understand why the ulcers are there, what the underlying cause is or whether there was a traumatic incident to cause them.
Then after treatment reestablising the hind gut bacteria killed off by omeprazole. Introducing a gut supplement to support good gut health and ensuring a cereal free diet with adlib forage is important as an ongoing preventative of the ulcers recurring.
Cost wise I claimed the WB via insurance and that claim came to a tad short of£1k just with one scoping. For my Dales youngster I just took the chance that we were right, he displayed every symptom of ulcers. The Abler treatment from the Seychelles cost just £100. The company were extremely helpful. I had the drugs within 4 days. I did the cleanse detox regime and likely spent £40 on green clay, chlorella and a bottle of human grade Aloe Vera, so total bill of £140. I have just got back on him so he had nearly 3 months off ridden work, but to be fair I wanted to resestablish his groundwork without the previous tension he held before riding him again.

An interesting website is, http://www.lunatunesfreestyles.com/horse_ulcers.htm

 

[CowCob]

My second case is my Dales youngster with whom I did loads of inhand balancing work before backing with my trainer but he always remained tense in his barrel. He never moved freely forward, was very upright and reactive to the leg and whip via bucking, kicking.

That's another thing that's adding up to ulcers, she's very tense and never seems to properly relax down and into the bit.

I just added everything up, and it works out as £127 for the whole thing including detox using the Abler Omeprazole.
It'll cost around £150-£200 depending to have her scoped.

Now I'm even more confused as to what to do, I'm almost certain at this point that's what it is. A woman at my yard who's TB is ulcer prone also thinks it's ulcers and YO is also thinking ulcers. So I'm between myself if I should just order the stuff and get it done or get her scoped.

I think what caused them was when she got moved to England, it was a just under 7 hour drive then she had to be stabled over the winter with only 3 hours T/O when she was used to being out 24/7 causing her to stress out. She had also had to be moved away from her best friend/foal/companion as well which didn't help.

 

[be positive]

As you seem to be insured I would get her scoped, if you self medicate and she gets better you know she probably has them but have no idea how bad, you could find they flare up after a while and if you have not declared the treatment your insurance can refuse to pay if you want to scope, treat and claim at a later date, if nothing shows on the scope you can look elsewhere without the possible red herring of the ulcers.
I had one scoped who was clear despite numerous symptoms, I still changed his feed and tweaked his management just in case, he later showed to have a minor issue with his feet that was probably the root cause, he had not been lame at any time but must have been holding himself a bit carefully at times which caused the ulcer like signs.

 

[CowCob]

As you seem to be insured I would get her scoped, if you self medicate and she gets better you know she probably has them but have no idea how bad, you could find they flare up after a while and if you have not declared the treatment your insurance can refuse to pay if you want to scope, treat and claim at a later date, if nothing shows on the scope you can look elsewhere without the possible red herring of the ulcers.
I had one scoped who was clear despite numerous symptoms, I still changed his feed and tweaked his management just in case, he later showed to have a minor issue with his feet that was probably the root cause, he had not been lame at any time but must have been holding himself a bit carefully at times which caused the ulcer like signs.

I'm going to give the vet a phone tomorrow then and get her out on Wednesday.

I wish they could just blimmin' say, would save a lot of hassle not to mention money!

 

[MTBTLT]

Agree with going ahead and getting her scoped. Your gut instinct that something is wrong is probably right! I sent my 4 year old to get scoped and her ovaries/hormones checked as I knew something wasn't right with her. We found she had 3 severe ulcers in her stomach but also found a heart irregularity! This would have never have been picked up had we not sent her to the vet school to get looked at.

 

[YasandCrystal]

I meant to say my Dales youngster also wood chewed which is unusual as he has constant access to forage and has a balanced diet. That's also stopped now since his ulcer treatment.
The only reason I didn't get him scoped was because he has never been stabled overnight and I didn't want to stress him or his WB buddy who has also had ulcers by taking him away overnight.