Navicular diagnosis

[SweetDreams]

Horse has sadly been diagnosed with navicular after nerve blocks and X-rays, devastated after being given grave prognosis. Read lots on barefoot anyone dealt with this diagnosis personally, any ideas/recommendations/advice.. many thanks

 

[ycbm]

The diagnosis usually means you have soft tissue injury inside the foot. I've dealt with it several times over and have one now with it in the back feet. I assume yours is the more usual front foot lameness? What showed up on the x rays?

ETA going to sleep now but i will respond tomorrow.,
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[Hackback]

It's a strange condition which seems to vary a lot from horse to horse. Mine was diagnosed several years ago with mild changes and has been in heartbar shoes ever since, on vet's advice. He does so well in them that I forget he ever had the diagnosis.

We had an older horse diagnosed and we tried taking his shoes off, especially as he was almost retired, but he couldn't cope without shoes so he had them back on his fronts for the rest of his life. He was field sound and ok for a walk round the village but if you tried trotting on a hard surface he'd soon go lame.

Good luck with yours, I hope you find something that helps.

 

[SEL]

I wish barefoot was always the answer but I've got one with a navicular diagnosis who has never been shod. Retired now.

With her I'd say her posture contributed, although the vets suspect she damaged her DDFT at the same time as the suspensory on the opposite hind leg (deep school surface). I do some in hand work with her and the better she holds herself the sounder she becomes. Unfortunately too much going on in her body for any long term results. If I had my time again though I'd have worked on getting her to hold herself better earlier.

I think rehab very much depends on what's going on in the foot. Mine wasn't insured on that leg and had a long list of issues so I decided against the MRI but if you're insured then I'd get one

 

[ycbm]

It's a strange condition

It's a cover all diagnosis for lameness in the back of the foot. The bones are not commonly the problem, which is more often strain of the ddft, collateral ligaments or impar ligament, sometimes inflammation of the coffin joint.

Without an MRI you don't know what the cause is, but only the day before yesterday the vet told me that doing an MRI would not change the recommended treatment for my horse, so we won't do one.

I've had great results with barefoot rehabs, but failed with one with a bone spur on the navicular, and in my own horse the strain is being caused by malformed pastern bones, which is why I asked what's on the x rays.

I have also known it in the front feet of a barefoot horse that had weak feet from too little exercise. He was resolved with a proper barefoot rehab program. Too little exercise is also why some don't recover from just being turned away, the feet need to work to grow a strong heel.

Likewise, metabolic issues causing weak feet have to be fixed before the horse can grow strong enough feet to resolve the problem causing the strain.

I get very frustrated that vets are still diagnosing "navicular" from changes to the navicular bone on x ray when it has been known since foot x rays were widely available that it doesn't correlate with soundness. The advent of MRI showed why - the lameness is most commonly a soft tissue injury.