poor performance ... ? ulcers

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miss_wilson

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Hi all I posted on here a couple of weeks ago about my made not going forward (actually not going out of walk!!). She has been into the horspital and they found a low grade a lameness right for that blocked out at the fetlock, she had a cortisone, and 2 weeks field rest, ulcers were mentioned at the time and she actually went into be scoped but then they found the lameness an went with that!
Fast forward 2 weeks get back on and guess what.... No different!! Still not wanting to do anymore that walk when ridden, lots of tail b swishing and reluctance!
I had a conversation with the vet yesterday and said to give it 2 weeks of walking out to see if it improves??
She is not girthy or sensitive just out of sorts!

So do I wait weeks or get her scoped sooner? I have a rather large vet bill as all the work they did on her hooves and fetlock is excluded! The scope would be under the insurance??

Any advice greatly appreciated
 
hmm thats a tough one. I presumme vet has said she is now sound? what does she do when you apply leg aids? if she has ulcers I would normally expect some reaction, either tail swish, tense up, or even kick out

I know its the age old story but could it be the saddle?

I have read a few on here say that some even reputable insurance companies will only pay for tests if you can prove something is actually wrong. I have never figured out how they work that one, but would check that insurance would still pay even if it was fine
 
Thanks for the reply, yes she swishes and tenses when leg aids are put on, but will move away from the leg if asked to move over, she is out 24/7 and is most of the year as we have no restriction on turnout!
She is now sound, her back is great and today just to check the saddle which I am sure is fine I rode in a bareback pad along the lane for 10 mins and tried to push up to trot on the way home but she was having none of it??
The vet has mentioned scoping for ulcers due to poor performance.
 
Hi hun, mine is exactly the same!!!!!!!!!!!!! i had my horses overies scanned incase it was hormonal was all clear, then i decided to get her gastro scoped she got ulcers and now having her treatment!!!!!! please please get her checked they are painful things and you will find your horse is not naughty, also i had her back and teeth checked to elimanate them problems think she is trying to tell you something is wrong, more than happy to speak to you if she does have ulcers xxxxgood luck let us know how you get on!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
Have they done a comprehensive blood test on her? If not, ask for one to include liver and muscle enzymes. Make sure she hasn't travelled, worked or done anything else active or stressful for a couple of days beforehand. If they have done one, ask for a copy of the full blood report for your own records and for future reference.

Check it to see what CK, creatine kinase, the main muscle enzyme is.

Not wanting to walk on at all could be from muscle damage, similar to tying up but not so extensive. If it is due to this, you'd expect to see CK above 350u/l.

If it is that, you then need to look for the cause of the muscle problem, which could be genetic and/or dietary (lack of selenium and/or vitamin E in diet).

I'd ask for them to scope her anyway. Our vets will do it at home, so maybe there's a vet in your area who can do that.

I'm astonished the hospital didn't discuss with you what they planned to do, investigation-wise, and especially if they chose not to scope when you'd asked them to do so.

Out of interest, what feed and vits/mins is she on (product name, weight) - just in case it looks like that may not be providing enough vit E or selenium.

Hope you get to the bottom of it.
 
She went in to be scoped, but the vet popped her on the lunge on the hard and picked up the lameness (we had similar issues 18 months ago, so think that's what the vet was thinking!!) when they found the lameness they medicated and stopped, said we would see how she goes with 2 weeks field rest then bring her back into work! The next stage is to get her scoped, luckily I'm only 10 mins from Leahurst so popping up there isn't a problem! She had bloods done first, although not entirely sure what they tested?, before she went in.

She is happy to walk just not trot?

She is currently on hifi molasses free 1/2 round scoop and topspec cool balancer 600g with oestress.

She has been lacking energy and been a bit behind the leg for a little while now but it hasn't affected her jumping or schooling previously, mostly noticed it when hacking.
 
Sorry, yes I misread what you'd said, but even if she is happy to walk on, but won't go up into trot, I'd still check the muscle enzymes, CK especially (as that's the only one that is only found in muscle cells, nowhere else, so is very specific for picking up muscle damage).

Really DO ask for a copy of whatever blood was done - I've lost count of the number of vets who have chosen not to report mild increases in muscle enzymes to owners, and yet these can be significant in pinpointing what's wrong.

The balancer you are giving only has 0.3mg selenium in a daily ration for a 500kg horse, so unless you know that your forage is very high in selenium, the chances are that it is not giving you enough to meet the recommended minimum daily intake. For example, my hay/grass only provides around 0.4mg per day per 500kg horse, so if mine were on that balancer they would only be getting 0.7mg per day (so well below the NRC's suggested minimum of 1.0mg per day).

Personally I would also choose to use a balancer with organic selenium (aka selenium yeast) rather than inorganic selenium (sodium selenite). It is known to be more bioavailable, and my own series of blood tests on 5 ponies are showing that muscle enzymes only improved a few months after starting on the organic selenium (not the inorganic).

So my suggestions would be Dengie Alfa-A balancer, which contains 1mg selenium (as selenium yeast) per 500kg horse per day, or Blue Chip which has 0.9mg selenium (as yeast) as well as 0.9mg selenium (as sodium selenite).

It may or may not be the root cause of your problems, but it's easy and cheap enough to change, and if it is the cause then you'd expect to see an improvement in 4 to 5 months from starting on it.

What I'm finding is that my gang show all the signs of EPSM (aka PSSM), equine polysaccharide storage myopathy, but in their case it appears to be a long term selenium deficiency.

Good luck.

Sarah
 
Update

I had her scoped yesterday as she was still not wanting to go forwards and the scope was clear! Also scanned her repo system which was clear...
Medicine passed over to ortho who going she was still 3/10 lame right fire even after having the steroid in her fetlock 4 weeks ago! And also 3/10 lame right hind!
So unsure what to do as we have exclusions in both her hooves and right fetlock! Rang insurer today who said unless diagnosis other than forelimbs is made insurance will not cover diagnostics!
Vet says next stage is gamma or nerve block, but if they font find anything significant... Which they may not! The vet bill comes to me! And although I would pay the earth to get my girl back to normal, even if we sort the hind we still have the forelimb to contend with!?! Confused!!
I spoke with the vet today and said I round bring her home take shoes off and turn her away for the winter!
Just not sure if that the right decision???
 
Bloods can only be "clear" for whatever they have specifically tested. Different vets choose different blood profiles depending on what they think may or may not be a problem. For example, you can test a blood for just one enzyme, or opt for a comprehensive profile which might test about 30 different things. Then there are a range of individual and less common things that can be tested for over and above that.

Given that your horse is refusing to go forwards into trot, it would be interesting to know whether her muscle enzymes are raised at all. Muscle problems can cause horses to show anything from a slight reluctance to work at faster speeds up to a full scale tying up. The enzymes to look at are CK (creatine kinase) in particular, as that is specific to muscle damage. Also AST and LDH can indicate muscle and/or liver damage.

Sorry to go on about this - if you have seen the blood report and if it includes those 3 enzymes, and everything on it is within the reference range which is shown alongside the horse's individual values, then I'd probably go with that.

However, if you've not yet seen the actual blood report, then I really would pursue that, particularly as it appears to be affecting multiple legs.

Of course it may be your horse has many different causes of lameness (I had a horse who was found to have 8 different causes of lameness on investigation at Newmarket), but then it might just be one thing which is acting systemically.

Sarah
 
Could it be EPSM (or is it ESPM), or something similar? Probably not, but after all the talk of muscle enzyme stuff, doesn't this affect that? You can get a home sampling kit that just needs a lock of hair in it, and will cost about £30 to get it tested to see if they have a genetic tendancy towards it?

Have you had a physio out?
 
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