Prolonged laneness- just an abcess??

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kgj66

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My horse has been not quite right for a few weeks now. At first she was just a bit tail swishy/tight. Settled after working in for 10mins or lunging. She had just been clipped so I assumed just a bit fresh and full of winter hi jinx.

Then she started to get a little bucky-and I noticed it was more on right rein so thought hmmm something wrong here. I was away for the weekend, so gave her 5 days off but she still wasn't right after that and I could see a little unevenness in her back end on the lunge. Suspected near hind was the problem. Also when she was loose- she was happy to canter on left rein but would stop rather than turn toght(she's a tb and usually throws herself around in every direction so knew something was wrong).

Vet called out- he could see slight lameness in near hind but asked to me to bring her to his place to do a proper diagnostic. (This is about 2 weeks after I noticed she wasn't quite right). Day before I took her to vet she couldn't put near hind on ground- vet out- he found an abscess, very deep.
I had never heard of an abscess starting and niggling at them for that long-but anyway, he said that's more than likely the cause-poultice/keep dry and clean and should be fine. That was last Saturday. Abscess drained- healing nicely, but still slightly lame on left leg-not tracking up and still not happy in canter.

I've booked to go back to vet on Saturday- I'm optimistic in that she is just over sensitive with abscess- farrier today said she is very tender at heel and it had prob burst through there as well, so have put dry dressing on tonight to keep it clean.

Question I suppose is has anyone had abscess problem go on so long, or is it more likely higher up like I suspect due to the discomfort I've seen in canter and abscess just a coincidence?
 
Oh yes, they can be little s*ds.

As I've got my abscess photos open at the moment - I can show you this...

100_1946.jpg


This was an awful abscess that went on and on and on. It tried to exit from an old nail hole and therefore never popped at the coronet. The nail hole was opened up by the Farrier, she was also seen by different Vets about it who also opened the hole up more.

ETA. Shoe off and hoof wall taken off to open it to the air (horse now sound).

100_1984-1.jpg
 
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Bumping, as I have a similar situation. The abscess seemed to burst about a week ago, but the farrier had to dig quite deep (a blackthorn). Just hoping that it is the bruising taking a long while to go down as it is she is still lame in trot.
 
My lad had an abcess in his hind last summer. He went hopping lame, but the vet couldn't pinpoint what was causing it as he didn't respond to the hoof pincer-thing. She thought it was in the leg (which was swollen), but there were no signs of injury/broken skin. He was put on bute at first, but just got worse and was then put on antibiotics. I was leading him out of his stable one day about 2 weeks into this and saw a trickle of black pus going down his hoof from the coronet band - bingo! After poulticing for a few days, all went back to normal and he was sound fairly soon after. I'm still not sure if it was a hoof abcess erupting at the coronet band, or a leg infection draining down! It did rumble on for a good two weeks at least, and was very worrying because he was SO lame. I'd dealt with straightforward foot abcesses before and they seemed to clear up much more quickly.
 
Yes they can take ages to come out if they're deep. My girl had one in the spring, she would be a bit off for a couple of days then sound again, then a bit off and so on. This went on for about a month! One morning she was hopping lame & vet came & dug very deep to find it, took a couple of weeks of tubbing, hot then dry poulticing before she was sound again. So total of 6 weeks! Before it showed itself properly no one thought it was an abcess as it had been going on for sooo long! How wrong we all were. Sure you'll be back to normal soon, keep doing what you're doing, they can be right sods these abcesses!
 
Gosh those pictures are a bit scary! Who knew a pesky little abscess could cause so much damage!
That's made me a little more optimistic! My last horse should same signs of slight lameness etc but ended to being sacroiliac damage so I'm paranoid the same thing is happening again! But I suppose when she canters, it is pressing down on the hind leg more- so if she was foot sore, she would be hesitant about it? She does almost hop with it after she's put pressure on when she as a little canter/buck- she's full of it with not being worked for 2 weeks!
 
My boy got an abcess in the summer he showed all the symptoms of your horse anything like that I always call the Farrier out if he thinks its more for the vet then I get the vet !
 
Syringed salt water into it today to help clean out and it came out through her heel! She seemed to not mind it so must have been making it feel better.
Put a dry poultice on so hoping there's not too much more to come out
 
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