Reverse Pedal bone rotation, kissing spines and nodular sarcoids

[LauraS5678]

Hello everyone, first time poster! I've read lots of threads previously and just read a really interesting one on reverse pedal bone rotation - I'm already very worried about my horses own pedal bone rotation and various other problems. I was hoping someone may have some advice/inspiration as I am at my wits end and starting to wonder how much I can out my poor horse through.

Paddy fractured his hock from a kick in 2012 (the actual fracture was minimal but huuuuuge gross wound that look 6 months box rest to heal). He was sound throughout this and has been since.

Since then he trod on his coronet band and had a problem with hoof development briefly - leaving a 'hole' in hoof. Vet and farrier agreed to fill hole and put heart bar shoe on to support. Again no lameness. It was filled for 5 months then dug out to find still some sort of fungal infection, white line disease and so X-rays were taken. Laminae attachment is affected and his pedal bone is rotated and displaced. The remedial farrier scared me a little about founder but was positive about the outcome and confident that a graduated shoe with frog support would correct this. (Hopefully you can see photo of X-ray below)

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?...340060.-2207520000.1401228974.&type=3&theater

However, whilst the hoof was still filled and I was blissfully unaware of the pedal bone problems Paddy was also diagnosed with kissing spines, 7 vertebrae affected. He had the ligament snip operation and was due to go to rehab when the pedal bone rotations was discovered. He can now not go to rehab as there is a risk of founder. When diagnosed with kissing spines he also failed both hock flexion tests and was 1/10 lame in three legs. Front left only sound leg.

My usual vet was on holiday when I had hoof X-rays and remedial farriery done so when she came out afterwards she was positive about the pedal bone prognosis and thought the farrier had been a little more dramatic than necessary. She then said to start bringing him back to work. I have managed to lunge him twice in the two weeks since then as he keeps pulling his remedial shoe off.

Paddy ALSO has 14 nodular sarcoids between his back legs . He had one in 2011 which fell off just before undergoing vet treatment. Another then developed in 2013 but was not growing. However since his kissing spines surgery (March this year) it has quadrupled in size and 13 more have joined it! The big one is about the size of two conkers and others much smaller currently. He has an insurance exclusion for sarcoids due to the previous one. The treatment the vet recommends would be laser surgery under a GA. I could not really afford to do this after all other vets bills and also really don't think it would be fair to put him through another surgery when they may come back!

Im not really sure what I'm asking here to be honest!! How much can one horse go through? He is blissfully unaware of all his problems but I am worried about the overall picture. He is going to end up suffering with his sarcoids one day, it just depends how long this scary rate of growth is going to keep up... Do I plough on with everything and ignore sarcoids and hope for the best? Or am I burying my head in the sand and need to accept he needs to be PTS so he doesn't end up suffering?

Please, no need to sugar coat replies...

PS if anyone could tell me how to add images I have pictures of everything that may help....

 

[Ronalda]

"... then dug out to find still some sort of fungal infection, white line disease and so X-rays were taken. Laminae attachment is affected and his pedal bone is rotated and displaced. "



What's happened to the toe in the x-ray, has it been resectioned due to WLD?

Laminar attachment looks OK. Misalignment of phalanges is simply due to cannon being forward of vertical. The pedal negative palmar angle can corrected by trimming toe sole and allowing more heel height.

 

[soloequestrian]

Bearing in mind that I only have experience of one horse with sarcoids, I do think there is a huge effect of stress on their development which would fit with what you've seen with yours. My boy had several sarcoids treated (with Liverpool cream) before I owned him. The treatment was successful but he subsequently developed three more small sarcoids. When I bought him and moved him to a low stress environment (full time turnout with friends and ad lib forage), these new sarcoids gradually regressed. I wouldn't make a decision to PTS at this point based on the inevitable worsening of the sarcoids because there is some chance that they won't actually get any worse if you can keep stress to a minimum. Can't really comment on the other problems apart from recommending that you look at all the barefoot info that is out there, particularly Rockley Farm.