suspensory injury??

[Horsegirl25]

Looking for some past experiences...
A few weeks ago I posted a thread about possible hock arthritis in my horse, the vet came out yesterday to scan with the view to inject his hocks yesterday if the x-rays showed arthritic changes however when she came out yesterday the x-rays showed a slight area however not enough that would be causing pain (she thinks).
Anyway the next step was to come back and scan his suspensory's and nerve block the suspensory's to see if that is the cause of the mild lameness. She thinks when she nerve blocked the hock some of it had got into his suspensory and essentially blocked that and that's why it looked as though he responded to the hock block..
The advise I have been given is to continue to turn out as normal and walking hacks only, not to go in the school on surface, however I am a bit concerned (and having mulled over it last night have since phoned the vets to query this advice, currently waiting on a call back) I thought a suspected suspensory injury would be box rest? Saying that he was never visibly lame, it started as loss of performance towards the end of August so I suppose he has been turned out daily since then..
The conversation was brought up about how much of a ridden career he has left ( we event currently up to BE90 ) and basically what we would have to do to keep him sound etc, it was an awful lot to take in and I was very upset. He has a home for life ridden or not he won't go anywhere but I want to give him the best possible chance, he loves working...

To be honest I don't know what I'm asking, it's an awful lot to take in and it's all if buts and maybes as he hasn't even been scanned yet..
Does anyone have a similar story with a happy ending?

 

[dixie]

I've had a couple of horses with suspensory issues and neither had box rest.
Neither were visibly lame either, they just stopped going forward in one instance and in the other wouldn't canter in the school.

The first one had field rest for a couple of months I think, it may have been more and then came back into a jumping life again
The other was a much younger horse, so gave him time off to grow and heal.

It probably depends on how severe it is with regard to the treatment and box rest and neither were significant. I seem to remember with the second horse, I was told I could continue walking him out so would go in line with the advice you've had.

 

[nutjob]

I've had 3 with suspensory issues. My current horse had an injury to his left front. The advice was box rest, then small area turnout, controlled walking in straight lines on a hard surface, starting with 5 min and then increasing. I went straight to small area turnout as my horse is way better being able to see and interact with my other horse over the fence. He got back into work and increased turnout but reinjured it so had to restart the whole thing again. It took 18 months in total. He's back out competing again now and his dressage is as good as ever. I don't jump anymore as he's a big lad and it's a front leg. In all the 3 cases I found that the damage was worse on ultrasound than it appeared based on the mild / intermittent lameness.

 

[Horsegirl25]

Thanks everyone, everything you read online is pretty doom and gloom and when your expecting hock injections and the vet starts talking about how much of a ridden career your rising 9 year old has ahead of him is a bit of a shock!
She did say she thought he looked better yesterday and that's after a week and a bit in the field when I was on holiday so rest may be an option.