PSSM advice

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Maz55

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After what appeared to be a tying up episode at the weekend (not triggered by exercise) when my horse got really cold in the field I’m beginning to wonder if she might have a mild form of pssm. Her hind leg muscles went rock hard and she was very stiff and lame. She remained lame (but no longer stiff) for a couple of days. Vet saw her today and said she’s fine. She’s a very spooky horse too which I’ve read can be a symptom in some cases and she has intermittent lameness of no known cause. She can get very uptight schooling for no apparent reason and tosses her head (not a head shaker). This isn’t the first time cold weather has resulted in very tight muscles. She definitely feels the cold more than other horses. My vet was convinced she hadn’t tied up and was anti any blood tests. So is the genetic hair test you can do yourself determinative? Or are there diet changes I could make without causing any issues that might help rule this out? I don’t want to feed lots of oil as she’s already a fatty!! Current diet is:

- high spec balancer inc optimum amount of selenium
- 50g linseed
- joint supplement
- salt 2 x 25ml scoops and more if sweating
- hormonal supplement containing magnesium tryptophan and herbs
- Timothy chop
- soaked hay care cubes
- spirulina

Thanks in advance
 
I had something very, very similar with my boy. He was very sensitive to the cold, tied up, head tossed, hind end lameness (muscles brick hard) and eventually it got to the point where he was unridable as he would barely move. We did PSSM tests and all clear, was very odd. I've spent thousands over the years investigating every possible issue. Eventually found mineral imbalances and after finding the Calm Healthy Horses website and following their advice and feeding their supplements he's 90% better and still improving :)

I'd definitely recommend looking at the CHH website for a horse like yours. All my horses have improved on their supplements.
 
Scarlett said:
I had something very, very similar with my boy. He was very sensitive to the cold, tied up, head tossed, hind end lameness (muscles brick hard) and eventually it got to the point where he was unridable as he would barely move. We did PSSM tests and all clear, was very odd. I've spent thousands over the years investigating every possible issue. Eventually found mineral imbalances and after finding the Calm Healthy Horses website and following their advice and feeding their supplements he's 90% better and still improving :)

I'd definitely recommend looking at the CHH website for a horse like yours. All my horses have improved on their supplements.
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Thanks Scarlett. That’s interesting as I actually have had her on the premium vits and mins for a while plus salt. I also tried their grazeezy and alleviate c along with swapping to Timothy chop. tried this for a good while and I managed to bring down the urine ph but it didn’t seem to make a lot of difference to her in any other respects. The only thing I didn’t do was take her off the grass completely but that’s virtually impossible in a livery yard setting unless you want your horse stabled 24/7 and I did feed hay in the field to encourage her not to eat the grass. How did you discover the mineral imbalances and how long before you saw improvements with the CHH regime? The annoying thing is she’s been great all summer - the soundest she’s ever been but this cold snap seems to have triggered something again!
 
tallyho! said:
I think your vet should have at least done CK and AST to rule out tying up.
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Me too. It's not an expensive blood test.

OP you can send off a sample of mane or tail hair to Animal Genetics UK to test for type 1. It's only about £30 and doesn't need a vet so I think it's worth ruling in / out. Vitamin E deficiency can also present like a myopathy and the best way to see if that is an underlying problem is to supplement it.
 
My info might be out of date as I sold my EPSM horse a while ago (the new owners were aware), but my understanding is as follows:

Hair test - there are 2 types of EPSM & the hair test picks up one but not the other, so you could possibly get a -ve when the horse has the other type.
Muscle biopsy - it is possible for different muscles to be affected, so the one biopsied might be -ve. Additionally, the damage can gradually build up, so there might not be enough damage to show up until the horse is older, e.g. 12.

I tried the high oil diet on mine & got a v dramatic improvement, which was not sustained. However, it indicated to me that we were dealing with EPSM.

To manage, at the time I had mine, there were 2 main ways. 1. High oil diet. Blocks the bad stuff from getting into the muscles. 2. ALCAR supplement - it's something to do with amino acids. It all gets rather complex but my understanding is that it makes the muscles release the bad stuff. ('Bad stuff' = the 'wrong' thing that is produced when the horse digests carbs - it works a bit like lactic acid, hence the muscle soreness.) You do NOT use high oil & ALCAR together as (I think) they might somehow cancel each other out?

All this is based on info from 5 or 6 years ago, & my extremely limited grasp of science, so please investigate further yourself.
 
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