Started as windgalls now Hole in Tendon!!!!!

[Universal]

My 6 year old mare who jumps 1.25's has been on and off lame for 2 months now. Sometimes she's great other times she's slightly lame. The vet came out yesterday to scan her and found a hole in her tendon. Hind Leg!!!!!! He doesn't seem to hopefull she will recover. I struggle to take this in as when we were trotting her up she was fine. She has always suffered from windgalls on this leg which you can see but she has never had any trouble from this. Has anyone else had this??? how did there's turn out?? We are thinking about putting her in foal as she is a grat mare and also an operation on it which the vet advised. I do really struggle to take this in because she's fine within her self full of life etc just sometime can be SLIGHTLY and i mean slightly lame. Surely with time off there is a chance.

 

[pinktiger]

i'm as shocked and confused as you are about said mare, but hopefully someone on here should be able to shed some light through experience!! I think tho shes ssooo talanted and with the right stallion things will be ok!!!ps(she jumped 125 like it was a 2ft'6) seriously scopy)

 

[henryhorn]

One of our horses had a 6% tear in it's tendon, it showed as a black hole on the X rays.
We gave her spa therapy, then rested her for 12 months, she came back sound with no sign of it when scanned. She has since competed in HTs' at a fast pace and is totally sound.
I have seen an arab retire here with the worst tendon injury I'd ever seen, huge swellings and written off by the insurance company.
Several years on there is little sign of the injury and he is without doubt sound.
I think you need to discover all the options, (stem therapy/laser treatment etc), then see what you think afterwards. It may be you give her a year off even breed from her then see how she is afterwards.
Provided she is barely lame now I really don't think the extra weight will make any difference at all.
Just ensure you choose a stallion who retired sound without similar trouble...

 

[Foxfolly]

Isn't that a similar injury as Supreme Rock and Primore's pride both retired with?

I'm sure it was somting like that, if so I know one or even both of them had stem cell treatment, but although it worked it wasn't as successful as had been hoped, so in the end it was decided as they were both older horses that they would retire from top level competition!!

This probably doesn't help much but it might job someone elses memory as to the injury and treatment etc..

 

[Briony2122]

Not quite the same, our big horse had hole in ligament, top vets in windsor treated it with ultrasound therapy, seemed to work. Note no prior evidence of lameness tho' must have been born with it. At first problem looked like splint from concussion. Horse had moved to yard with concrete floors & walkways from having been on dirt stable floors & sandy soil. Also change in farrier to one less good. So probably thats why it showed up.

 

[scotsmare]

My friends horse has just been diagnosed with the same thing - she's been through the same stuff - windgall looking swelling, on and off lame - I met her at the vets with our respective crocked horses and she had her boy scanned before mine. She evented / show jumped him and it's not looking particularly good recovery wise.

 

[Llwyncwn]

My mare has recently been scanned and a hole in her superficial flexor was found (I saw it on the scanner). She is due to have stem cell treatment in 3 weeks which has a good chance of success. She also need to have her annular ligament cut which is of more concern to me than the stem cell implant. This too began as a huge windgall and on schooling I felt her slip which resulted in a windgall the size of an egg on one side of the fetlock which became hard.

Go for the treatment is my opinion. Hope it all works out.

 

[RachelB]

[ QUOTE ]
My 6 year old mare who jumps 1.25's has been on and off lame for 2 months now. Sometimes she's great other times she's slightly lame. The vet came out yesterday to scan her and found a hole in her tendon. Hind Leg!!!!!! He doesn't seem to hopefull she will recover. I struggle to take this in as when we were trotting her up she was fine. She has always suffered from windgalls on this leg which you can see but she has never had any trouble from this. Has anyone else had this??? how did there's turn out??

[/ QUOTE ]
My horse tore her deep flexor tendon in Feb 2007. She went very severely lame on one day (9/10ths) then was only very slightly nigglingly lame from then on (half a 10th). One of the worst things about tendon injuries is that on a scale of 1 to 10 for severity, the injury can be a 9 but the clinical signs suggest that it is a 1 or 2. This is also why some tendon injuries never come right, because the owner assumes that as soon as the horse is sound then it can work again... very much not true, it takes 1-2 years for the tendon to heal as much as it is going to. Injuries to the front limb flexor tendons are generally the worst as these take much more of the strain than any others. Hind flexor injuries are generally slightly easier to heal, and extensor tendons tend to be easier still (not that tendons are every really easy, I just mean relatively!) Vets are generally reluctant to be positive about tendon injuries in my experience, and justly so seeing as once damaged a tendon never fully heals and is more likely to be re-injured. What I have found is that you should never expect a tendon to heal and to be able to ride your horse again, although never give up hope of it happening. My horse injured herself 16 months ago now, she had four and a half months box rest in total then 11 months field rest so far on top of that. She hasn't been ridden for 15 months. She's not yet fully sound but she had a severe re-injury of the DDFT in the worst place possible (right underneath the hoof) coupled with cartilage problems and an unhelpful (to say the least) conformation. A year is about the minimum you should be looking at time-wise before your horse is sound and working again, if you are really really lucky.

[ QUOTE ]
We are thinking about putting her in foal as she is a grat mare and also an operation on it which the vet advised. I do really struggle to take this in because she's fine within her self full of life etc just sometime can be SLIGHTLY and i mean slightly lame. Surely with time off there is a chance.

[/ QUOTE ]
Please don't put her in foal just because she is injured and can't do anything else. I am considering putting my mare in foal in a couple of years time, but only because I want a foal of my own. I would never breed from her if I wasn't fully intending to keep the foal for myself. Too many people "just put it in foal because it's injured" IMO. I'm sure you will think over all your options very carefully

Best advice is not to panic. Make sure you talk it all over with your vet and make sure you fully understand the injury and any treatments offered to you. Good luck, you will need it!

 

[Universal]

Oh god no!!!! We were due to have my old young riders horse back to have a foal out of her but she lost it and now is a foster mum. We have activly been looking for a broodmare so seems silly buying one when i have a great mare just there.

When you say box rest for 4 1/2 months that was 100% box rest???? No walking or turning out in a school ect. I walked her up the drive to day and being the mare she is wanted to take me for a walk. Positive thing is she looked sound.

Any ideas on these cold boots etc. Good/ bad help or not??

 

[RachelB]

[ QUOTE ]
When you say box rest for 4 1/2 months that was 100% box rest???? No walking or turning out in a school ect. I walked her up the drive to day and being the mare she is wanted to take me for a walk. Positive thing is she looked sound.

[/ QUOTE ]
My horse wasn't walked out for a number of reasons, but most horses get walked out during their box rest after an initial short period of total rest. Healing with tendons begins very quickly and takes a long time so you need to be making some attempt to give the tendon what is known as "controlled loading" to help the new fibres align correctly so the tendon heals as much like a normal tendon as it can. I was allowed to turn my horse out for up to two hours every day in a small stable-sized pen - she is a VERY laid-back horse though compared to most so generally this is not advisable as it runs the risk of the horse flipping out and damaging itself further. I only did four and a half months because my horse went undiagnosed for the first three months, then she had Cartrophen injections for four weeks, then she was going to be allowed out after two quiet weeks... she had other ideas and jumped out of her pen

so was confined for another few weeks! Like I said (probably, without re-reading it) in my previous post, the hardest bit about tendon injuries is that the horse usually comes sound very quickly and the owner usually thinks "oh that's ok then" and wants to push the horse too quickly for the healing tendon. This is why tendon injuries tend to recur fairly quickly, and is also one of the likely reasons for firing being so popular previously - it gave the owner a visible injury to deal with and as such a visible deterrent to be working their horse too soon. Whether your horse is sound or not, REST is IMPERATIVE. Your mare's injury is likely an older one if you have been noticing this intermittent lameness over a while so she is likely to be at some stage of the healing process, which is why she will be looking sounder

Of course, by all means be pleased that your horse looks sound - what I wouldn't have given for Maiden to look sound so quickly!

[ QUOTE ]
Any ideas on these cold boots etc. Good/ bad help or not??

[/ QUOTE ]
Cold therapy is generally only effective within the first week or two of the injury. If your horse's legs are swelling or anything like that, then yes cold therapy can be very beneficial (especially cold hosing, which is far better than any other method of applying cold therapy yet known to horses!). However as I said this is likely to be an older injury and so cold therapy will have limited benefits. I never cold hosed my horse unless her legs filled - by the time she was on box rest it was three weeks after the initial injury and I had completely missed the window of opportunity anyway! I only bandaged because she had compensating injuries in her right leg from taking the strain off her left leg for so long and it helped to keep the swelling down (bandages do not support the leg in any way, contrary to popular belief, but they can make sure there is nowhere for the leg to swell to if they are applied at the correct tension). Cold hosing then is up to you, it may be slightly beneficial but it may not. It will certainly be very tedious

but I wouldn't necessarily bother spending money on cold boots unless you have enough time to be replacing them as soon as they get slightly warm.

If you want to PM me any questions I am more than happy to try to answer anything (from my experience and my extensive literature review of the subject!)

 

[Universal]

This is the treatment i have been offered. What has your vet said about success. My vet(which is TOP) said all it will do is keep her comfortable. Well to me she is comfortable already. So if there is no chance of a comback even in 18 months time i don't see why i should rush in with the operation. If she does become worse of course she would have it. I just don't want to cause any more problems.

 

[Doublethyme]

Not sure if its similar, but my mare has damage to her annular ligament and also her DDFT - vet hasn't said a "hole" as such, just damage. On the original scan she had an area of calcification - like a small slug!

She's been off since November, had three lots of scans to monitor progress so far and due for another lot in August and hopefully the OK to start doing something with her.

She has had no other treatment except 2 months box rest and then small paddock rest and obviously a course of bute in the early days. Although I myself have been using herbal and homeopathic remedies on her and she has magnetic boots on at times, particularly in the early days and also has had regular twice daily treatment with a Bioscan light therapy boot. (Does it all work, haven't a clue, but it makes me feel like I'm "doing" something, so it helps me!)

Her injury at last scan in April is much better, the annular ligament is much reduced in size (even though my vet initially didn't think it would change much) and the DDFT injury is showing as half healed over and hopefully now is on its way to fully healed over (she's certainly not reacting to palpation over the injury site now).

My vet has mentioned the annular ligament operation, but only in passing as something we can keep on the back burner if needed, but at present he doesn't see it is necessary.

Her official prognosis on the vet report was "guarded to fair", but my vet who is reknowned for his perssimism says that he feels she will come back into some kind of work. I'm not expecting anything and so all things will be a bonus and I have made it very clear to him that I am perfectly prepared to retire her if that is what is needed, but he has reassured me several times that he doesn't see that in her immediate future, just not sure what level or type of work she will come into. I have already ruled out a return to any type of jumping but mainly because some additional x-rays showed up some early arthritis signs on top of the ligament/tendon injury. I'll be happy to just have her back as a lightish hack and hopefully low level unaff dressage pone, but we'll see.

Best of luck with your horse. Its a long road.