my 14 month gelding has cut his leg

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snowhitex

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hey all
im having a dilemma ,,my boy cut his cannin bone quite badly an the vet has sedated him 4 times now to change his dressing the wound is very open my concern is he had to be twitched today to be sedated an was very distressed an panicky my vet has given me sedation now to put under his tongue....my problem is do i leave the wound open an let nature take its course an not distress him anymore as hes so young i fear he wont forget this for a while or do i carry on with the sedation ....he is a irish draught x throughbred 15hh an usually very quiet untill now:confused:
 
Difficult to say without seeing the wound. If you do leave it and proud flesh develops it may need to be fiddled with more further down the line. The ideal is to get it closed now rather than leaving it to granulate, but I know how quickly even the best natured horses can start to hate being poked and prodded regularly in this way. It also depends how much the end cosmetic appearance of the wound matters to you.

If you do continue down the bandaging route then I would want to minimise bandage changes to every 4- 5 days if the nature of the wound allows, and not skimp on sedation to minimise his annoyance and awareness of what is going on. Using oral sedation in advance of the vet arriving will make it easier to sedate intravenously and will add to the effect of the sedation.

On the upside, horses usually forget these things, but I know how awful it is when it seems as though your youngster's nature is changing as a result of something like this.
 
Without seeing the cut it is very hard to say, but if the vet has felt the need to put a dressing on the wound it would suggest to me a dressing is needed. Is it really necessary to sedate the horse while changing the dressing? My pony had a deep tear in his nostril which was unsuitable for stiching and obviously we couldn't bandage it, he was given a antibiotic jab and we used manuka honey on the wound which helped granulation and it was really good, it healed the wound very quickly and there is no scar. Maybe that would be worth a try when it is a bit more healed. If the dressing is very painful to remove it may be because all the healing tissue is being removed when the dressing is being taken off so making the healing process very slow. good luck and hope he is better soon :)
 
thankyou for your replies all good info ,,,,the vet has said its up to us which road we take but i would like minimal scarrin but the cosmetic look isn a problem as we are keepin him, so long as he is ok, the wound is very open tendon was showing but not damaged luckily when he done it the wound was very pink but now its quite red the vet said this morn that he can see pink edges around the cut which is good .....im the same i would like to leave the bandage a little longer for obvious reasons he went 4 days an i took it off this mornin but as i said it was fine till he licked it .....think ill have to get a crib cradle if i leave it open.....but i think im gonna try the sedation under his tongue an see how he goes....jus really upsettin seein him so distressed this mornin ...hes such a loving an giving baby an very quiet ...
 
Hi, probably a bit late now and hope the wound has healed but with all wounds we get on horses we use the same approach. Clean and wash thoroughly with warm water (40C) and initially use a strong disinfectant to prevent the bacteria getting a foothold. Depending on the depth of the wound you might need to wash and disinfect more than once a day. We never use antibiotics and just make sure the tetanus is up-to-date. We recently had a young stallion in who had got a bad wound on his inside thigh. With this process the wound healed in 3 weeks. Also worth checking the temperature and keeping an eye on the tissues around to make sure that the infection isn't spreading internally. Actually, in my experience it is the small wounds that you need to be most careful of.
 
My boy got kicked in the field and as a result got a nasty deep cut on the back of his hock, it went right through the skin and narrowly missed the ligaments and bursa! Vet came, flushed/probed etc and the wound was stitched. He now wears a dressing, which was changed today.
He's box rested now until the stitches come out :(
He's fine with his dressing being changed, I popped him infront of a haynet and changed it then, he was absolutely fine, as I thought he'd be difficult/very sore.
 
Global herbs supercalm instant. My daughter has an old connie mare who is a nightmare for the farrier. She said that this calmer is wonderful and now keeps a supply for when her farrier is due.
 
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