Vet coming this morning

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southerncomfort

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Little mini shetland has suddenly dropped a load of weight just over the last week or so.

Eating with gusto but not producing hardly any droppings last couple of days.

Happy in herself but looking very tucked up.

Hoping it's as simple as a loose tooth, but she only had her teeth done 3 months ago by the dental specialist vet and all was fine then.

Will get her tested for cushings, but haven't known them lose weight that quickly with cushings.

This is the little feral pony who is terrified of vets so this will be an ordeal for all concerned I think!
 
Mine dropped weight quickly with cushings, her bloods came back with heavy worm burden too even though she had a clear count from Westgate a month earlier.
 
Worm count was zero.

So we've ruled a few things out, but we are no closer to a diagnosis.

Because she is mostly feral, we can't subject her to lots of invasive tests. At the moment we are going to watch and wait. If she picks up, then it was likely just a virus.

If she doesn't, or gets worse, we can try prascend or steroids, but getting any drug in to her will be a challenge.

We've also discussed the possibility of something more sinister going on.

I can't go there just yet, but with the one and only symptom being weight loss, I know it's a possibility.
 
Couldn't read and run, I don't know what else to say other than fingers crossed it turns out just to have been a virus. Look after yourself too, it's never nice having the worry of not knowing and it being difficult to get an accurate diagnosis. Sometimes other people don't understand that but they aren't what matters now.
 
My 25 yo mini tends to just suddenly become quite underweight in Feb/March time for no discernible reason. A week of condition nuts and she is back to normal. I just put it down to her body taking a lot out of itself to pop her 5 tonnes of hair out for spring! She didn’t do it quite as badly this year, but I’m watching daily for her to suddenly look poor before the summer grazing.

I will add she has ems/cushings and this is the first year she’s had prascend for the whole winter.
 
Dam1 said:
My mare dropped off weight in a week. Cushings test came back as ok however I then had the STIM test for cushings and she came back well over recommended levels and went on Prascend and is now doing well. Might be worth a thought if it's being difficult to diagnose
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Yes, I think a Prascend trial is probably going to be the next step.
 
Equi said:
My 25 yo mini tends to just suddenly become quite underweight in Feb/March time for no discernible reason. A week of condition nuts and she is back to normal. I just put it down to her body taking a lot out of itself to pop her 5 tonnes of hair out for spring! She didn’t do it quite as badly this year, but I’m watching daily for her to suddenly look poor before the summer grazing.

I will add she has ems/cushings and this is the first year she’s had prascend for the whole winter.
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That's interesting!

Can you remember how old she was when she started dropping weight?
 
southerncomfort said:
That's interesting!

Can you remember how old she was when she started dropping weight?
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About 22. I did have the dentist out and she had her holes flushed but the week of nuts put her right. When she got footy I had her bloods and she started the meds. Thankfully she didn’t go into serious lami as I caught it really early.
 
Equi said:
About 22. I did have the dentist out and she had her holes flushed but the week of nuts put her right. When she got footy I had her bloods and she started the meds. Thankfully she didn’t go into serious lami as I caught it really early.
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This is exactly what happened to mine but she was 19. She'd had a couple of years of not shedding until late in the year but previous Cushings tests said she was fine ??? It was only after the STIM test she was diagnosed. She was also at the same time diagnosed with EMS so a double whammy 😱 x
 
Hope she picks up soon and you get to the bottom of the problem. My 26yo mini (my non-feral one) also has suddenly dropped weight and pooing very little. Had vet and dentist out as he does have v poor teeth. Reading all this has reassured me a bit as it seems we are not alone and could be related to time of year/ change of coat and the lack of grass. By the way, had my feral Shetland seen by the dentist too. The vet gave her muscular sedation as you suggested and it did the job. It took 20 minutes or so to act but she was good as gold - amazingly teeth in pretty good order so some one must have looked after her at some point in her past. Thank you for your help over this.
 
winnie said:
Hope she picks up soon and you get to the bottom of the problem. My 26yo mini (my non-feral one) also has suddenly dropped weight and pooing very little. Had vet and dentist out as he does have v poor teeth. Reading all this has reassured me a bit as it seems we are not alone and could be related to time of year/ change of coat and the lack of grass. By the way, had my feral Shetland seen by the dentist too. The vet gave her muscular sedation as you suggested and it did the job. It took 20 minutes or so to act but she was good as gold - amazingly teeth in pretty good order so some one must have looked after her at some point in her past. Thank you for your help over this.
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That's great news! 🙂
 
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