Starving for gastroscope - how long?

Nocturnal

Nocturnal

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For those who’ve done this, how long did your vet instruct you to withhold food for? I’ve been told to starve for 17 hours which seems excessive to me, so looking for other experiences and whether you found food still in the stomach if it was shorter than this.

Ta ☺️
 
Told to starve for 16 hours. I gave mine a wet feed of soaked grass nuts last thing as he doesn't drink well in the night and it was when the weather was hot. No sign of anything in stomach so probably could have left it a bit later. Also, hay would probably stay in the stomach longer.
 
I had one done last month, she is on an overnight in field, day in stable routine.
Vet was happy to keep her in that routine and she was starved from 7am when she came in and was scoped at 4pm.
Stomach was completely empty.
 
I take my horses away at around 2230 - 2300. Vet arrives at about 1000 for a 1030 scope. Done 3 scopes now like this at home and they have all been good empty stomachs.
 
Thanks all, sounds like it’d be fine to make it 12 hours

pistolpete said:
See surely ulcers can form is 6-8 hours? Dont get how this is good practice. I suppose they can tell if there new ones.
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Seems like as a one off horses can tolerate it without too much issue. My horse hates being in though so the shorter I can make it without invalidating the results the better.
 
pistolpete said:
See surely ulcers can form is 6-8 hours? Dont get how this is good practice. I suppose they can tell if there new ones.
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Ulcers don’t form like that. You might get some abrasion from the acid on the empty stomach lining, and you will aggravate any that are there, but you don’t form an ulcer on a one-off exposure.
 
Starve from 4.30pm for a 10.30am scope. So 18 hours. 6 hours without water.

Mine has to wear a muzzle with the hole taped up or she will eat poo.

Initially when her stomach wasn’t emptying she was starved for 24 hours and then flushed with cola to clear the blockage as they didn’t want to starve any longer.
 
I would ask your vet what they recommend and follow that, when mine didn’t empty they did do the second scope at half price but they had starved her so knew that protocol had been followed.
 
HopOnTrot said:
I would ask your vet what they recommend and follow that, when mine didn’t empty they did do the second scope at half price but they had starved her so knew that protocol had been followed.
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They said 17 hours as mentioned in first post, however I don’t feel that’s going to work for us. 6 hours without water seems a bizarre and unnecessary stipulation, unless they already knew there was an issue with delayed gastric emptying?
 
starved from 8pm and scoped about 8am, so 12 hours. shavings and a tiny bit of hay in her stomach first time around, i can only assume she was scrounging around for any piddly strands in her bed! empty 2nd time, obviously did a better job of mucking out that time😂
 
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