photosenstivity

Birker2020

Birker2020

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Last night noticed horse had gunk above coronet band so cleaned area. tonight noticed three legs had the same and a scorch type mark on cannon bone. the areas are secreting sticky fluid and mud fever type scabs. on sunday we went on fun ride and horse snatched a couple of mouthfulls of what i thought was barley but now believe was rye. have googled as convinced not mud fever and there is a link between rye and photosensation.have hibiscrubed stood horse in tub of water to remove any trace thoroughly dried and applied amtiseptic cream. y.o will ring tomz if any continuation and i will get vet out tomorrow night. horse ate rye or barley on hack about 18 months ago and came out in urticra type rash all over body. anyome else had this with their horse? He is out at grass tonight and will come in at dawn so wont be exposed to sun overnight. any helpful suggestions? positive its photosensisation the one mark looked like a cigarrette type of burn really weird. stopped oozing anyway and looks fine now. horse has four white socks. sorry for long post.
 
Please can someone help me with this? The YO has text me to say the area above his coronet band is oozing again, like a brown sticky fluid and his other legs are still affected. She also sent me a photo but I don't know how I can put it on here as its through my phone. I'm going to ring the vet now and get advice and hopefully get them out tonight. We have both ruled out mud fever.

It is nowhere near as bad as this photo image from the web of photosensitivity, but the browny red colouring is slightly similar
http://www.bing.com/images/search?q...cd19c89808b5806a615d508777a3d4do0&ajaxhist=0]
 
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Had long talk with vet over phone, they are coming out after work. I think they are a bit skeptical and think its mud fever, but its the connection with the fun ride, and what he ate and the previous reaction I can't really take the chance.

Going to rename my horse for my next show outing so the commentator can say; "And next into the ring is ****** riding her own 'Money Pit'" lol :)
 
Unfortunately by the time you wrote your first post, my best advice was irrelevant because it would have been to 'not touch the legs at all.'

Stabling during the day and turning out when it's dark is good. Suncream on the legs before they get sore is good (so next year slap it on as a preventative measure). You'll have to see what the Vet says now, but be warned, I spent £800 with the Vet when my boy had it and every topical treatment that the vet prescribed made it worse and he ended up with pretty much every square inch of pink skin sore - hence my original and sadly obsolete advice to not touch.

So therefore I really hope that he doesn't have photosensitivity after all. :)
 
Faracat said:
Unfortunately by the time you wrote your first post, my best advice was irrelevant because it would have been to 'not touch the legs at all.'

Stabling during the day and turning out when it's dark is good. Suncream on the legs before they get sore is good (so next year slap it on as a preventative measure). You'll have to see what the Vet says now, but be warned, I spent £800 with the Vet when my boy had it and every topical treatment that the vet prescribed made it worse and he ended up with pretty much every square inch of pink skin sore - hence my original and sadly obsolete advice to not touch.
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I understand what you are saying about leaving well alone, but I had to get all the sticky secretions off his leg, they could not stay on as they would have attracted flies and I was worried about infection. The vet on the phone said I did the right thing in treating it like I did but that is maybe because she still thinks its mud fever (and maybe/hopefully it is). Did your horse have liver problems/was he blood tested? If they think it is photosensitization then I will do this if they suggest.

She doesn't think its sunburn - she asked me if his nose which is very white was pink or had been burnt, and I had not noticed this last night when I gave him a kiss so she doesn't think it is that. I did wash his whole body on Sunday afternoon on the return from the fun ride - I had already washed him off best I could at the ride as he was quite sweaty being a hot day, so when I got home I gave him a tepid warm shampoo body wash (used this product loads of times before) and then I turned him out, it was still a bit sunny so I suppose he could have got sunburnt. But she said in her experience sunburn doesn't usually present as oozing browny red fluid.

I am wondering if its also may have something to do with his immune system, I've heard of this condition breaking out above the coronet band on the horses skin. I have got to stop googling as its proper worrying me now.
 
I have just dealt with this on one hind white leg, called the vet out a couple of months ago now and she gave antibiotics, a special shampoo and filtabac cream. I also put him on a liver tonic from Trinity Consultants.
I have just got to the end of it now and his leg is not swollen and sore anymore, I did find washing it made it worse, so I just wiped his leg clean, did not pick the scabs and have been covering it in filtabac everyday and it seems to have done the trick!
You can buy a tub of it from Pet Drugs Online , does not need a prescription.
Hope you get it sorted!
 
pines of rome said:
I have just dealt with this on one hind white leg, called the vet out a couple of months ago now and she gave antibiotics, a special shampoo and filtabac cream. I also put him on a liver tonic from Trinity Consultants.
I have just got to the end of it now and his leg is not swollen and sore anymore, I did find washing it made it worse, so I just wiped his leg clean, did not pick the scabs and have been covering it in filtabac everyday and it seems to have done the trick!
You can buy a tub of it from Pet Drugs Online , does not need a prescription.
Hope you get it sorted!
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Thank you. Did your vet say it was photosensitisation and did you find out what had caused it - contact or something eaten?
Glad your horse is on the mend now.
 
Thanks for that info. horse not in the slightest bit lame and no swelling. y.o did notice hind legs swollen yesterday but they do sometimes in this heat and they went down straight away as is the norm when i hacked down the road. Eating fine and bright and alert. Its just the way its presented itself again today
 
A couple of thoughts, LV has a few causes not just sunlight and is essentially a hypersensitivity reaction, I do think as horses get older they do seem to have more trouble with such sensitivities. It is certainly only in the last couple of years that F has needed injecting for mites because I cannot get on top of the scabs otherwise and his neighbour of the same age with sweet itch gets worse every year and has had terrible trouble with his legs this year. We don't know what he is reacting to legwise but uv boots for turnout have helped. That would be my first thought as you suspect yours had a rash previously from eating similar.
Alternatively if it is infection rather than LV then cushings would always be in the back of my mind due to the associated compromised immune system (I am not going over old ground here, just stating that in my widening experience of scabby legs it has been a factor).
 
ester said:
A Alternatively if it is infection rather than LV then cushings would always be in the back of my mind due to the associated compromised immune system (I am not going over old ground here, just stating that in my widening experience of scabby legs it has been a factor).
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Funnily enough I was going to PM you to ask your advice re: this, but maybe you will be able to tell me now, if it proves to be an infection would the vet be able to split a blood sample so that half went to the lab to test for cushings and half went to the other lab to check bloods? Kind of kill two birds with one stone type of thing.
Holey Moley, I've just googled LV and I hope to God he does not have that. Maybe it is mud fever that is presenting totally differently to how it has before, but I have never known mud fever this persistent insomuch as the leg was clean, non oozing, and dry last night after treating it, this morning from the photo the YO has sent me its the same as it was before I treated it yesterday, on all four legs now, oozing sebum. This does mimic normal mud fever behaviour which is why I am concerned.

I would like to mention that I went through a water complex on the XC course and it had a huge amount of scum floating on top of it, whether it was blue green algae or not I have no idea, it wasn't until I was in it that I noticed how bad it was. Could it be a reaction to that I wonder??

Thanks for your help guys
 
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No, they'd prob have to take a couple of vials but same needle ;). Though actually for legs, with no swelling/heat it would be better for them to swab to check for infection I would think anyway. I do think these scabby leg things can be tricky as they can have a few causes. I am not sure if LV is relevant to old age/cushings particularly, I know AdorableAlice's chap currently suffers from both and I do think we don't know the whole story on the cushings things.

My opinion on Frank's scabbiness is that he reacts to things - it can be heat, fly bites, mites as said and they then develop into a low grade bacteria infection - not as bad as the pic you posted they don't ooze quite that much and for the most part I can resolve with sulphur+sudocreme but the last two mays it has gotten completely out of control rapidly- thankfully a dectomax injection resolves within 24 hours which even the vets stay is staggeringly quick so it must be some little nipper which sets them off.
 
RE LV and old age, my boy had it the worst the summer that he was three years old. I was advised to cut alfalfa from his feed and to be very careful about any plants in the grazing that are known to be related to photosensitivity.
 
ester said:
I'd be interested to know what your vet says if you don't mind reporting back AC :)
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certainly. still waiting for vet they have an emegency call out first. His legs are worse than last night. just asked a fellow livery who has seen exactly same on another horse and it was contact with buttercups. same sort of burn thing. she also said no way mud fever.will look a right fool if it turns out to be that . rather that than LV anyway!
 
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Ok vet been out said not LV for definite nor photosensitivity is very likely bacterial skin infection due to contaminated water that was in water complex gave steroid inj and antibiotic have to wash in sulphur wash and cream up well with mud fever cream. could be due to parasites but will know more after a week. she wants an update on monday. trotted up declared sound checked digital pulses on all four feet absolutely fine can go out in field. no bloods taken as not necessary very much doubted cushings said not to bother testing. will do skin scrapes for parasitic activity if no vast improvement in a week. said very sore inder scabs. he was very good as i picked them off again like she told me to. so relieved. will contact x.c course tomz and make them aware said nothing to do with amything ingested. thanks for your help all x
 
My mare developed very severe photosensitivity last year. She's coloured, and lost all the skin on all her white patches within a couple of days. Turned out to be her liver and she has had a lot of investigation, and treated with steroids. She's turned out in a UV rug and boots and also fly mask which seems to be working as she's a nightmare to keep in.

Hope you get to the bottom of it, it's horrible :(
 
I'm a big fan of sulphur ;)
re the parasite situation you are lucky to find the ******* on a skin scrape (I tried myself!) but I should think that if it is bacterial it will resolve with the current plan fairly quickly.
I still think it a bit odd that he would get infected so easily if no broken skin/no compromised immune system but obv the vet has seen him :).
 
ester said:
I'm a big fan of sulphur ;)
re the parasite situation you are lucky to find the ******* on a skin scrape (I tried myself!) but I should think that if it is bacterial it will resolve with the current plan fairly quickly.
I still think it a bit odd that he would get infected so easily if no broken skin/no compromised immune system but obv the vet has seen him :).
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I think its weird too and it would be so interesting to see if any other horses had developed skin problems that went on the same ride, she did say it may have also been walking through long grass but thought it more likely that it was the water complex. So relieved. She was such a knowledgeable vet, she was over two hours late to the appointment, and kept apologizing. Sadly the call before had resulted in the decision by the lady to end her horses suffering and the on call vet was going over to do that so I didn't care about her being late, obviously.

Will try and pay off half the bill today :(
 
Just to add I have just rang my YO to see how his legs are and she has said that his legs are 'beautifully clean' this morning so we feel that the steroid and the antibiotic injection must have kick started it amazingly well. The whole thing is very bizarre as Wednesday night they were beautifully clean after I'd cleaned them all up when he went out and covered in weeping sores and gunge less than 12 hours later on his return from the field. I didn't think steroids/anit b's kicked in that quickly.

One more thing, I had exercise bandages on him on the fun ride on Sunday on all four legs (as I always do when I SJ/fun ride/school) and the water was obviously held in the bandages for a period of time, the XC course was five miles away from the end of the ride. By the time we'd reached the finish and I'd untacked and taken the bandages off I am guessing he would have had wet legs for a good hour, hour and a half maybe which would have given bacteria time to leach into the skin, particularly if there had been any lesions. I check his legs everyday so I would have been surprised to have found open cuts/sores on all four legs. I asked the vet if he had had a cut on one leg would the bacteria have spread to the other three but she said no, he would have had to have had all legs contaminated. Goodness knows what may have been in that water. I will ring the organisers now, to warn them of the possibility. I hope they don't think I am being funny, but I have to stop someone/something else getting this - it could be a public health hazard as well, if kids/dogs spash through there, (or if someone fell off in it). At least if they know they can do something if they so choose.
 
Ah now the bandages would make much more sense, as it would have softened the skin/provided ideal bacterial conditions etc.
Glad it has worked, they can work that quickly :)
I have a bill to pay today too if that helps!
 
ester said:
I have a bill to pay today too if that helps!
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Ha I feel your pain. I rang up my vets yesterday, paid the last £55 off my account that I thought had a nil balance and said, "right ready for the next lot".

The vet was very interesting. I queried him going out to grass last night with the steroid injection she had given him and she said that the current latest thinking is that they (presumably some clever research boffins somewhere) are trying to disprove the connection between steroids and laminitis risk in horses. It is currently 'most unlikely' that steroids use can bring on laminitis. Fascinating really.
 
Had an interesting discussion with our partner about that recently with regards to they do think the risk has likely been over stated. It is still there obviously but they have been trying to do some meta analysis I think to get a better idea. Frank has had 2 lots the last couple of months but we were still a bit careful, I think the trouble is that if it does happen it can be pretty catastrophic which is always going to increase fear about it. It did make me pleased I had his cushings done though or I would have been more worried about him having 2 lots in fairly quick succession, it meant I worried slightly less at least though obv still worrying generally! Latest the vet said he's never had lami has he? but do you manage him carefully?, I was like no he hasn't, but yes of course he is an ageing welsh cob :p whom you can see ribs on, do you think that he gets adlib grass ;)
 
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