What the hell do I do now then? - lame horse

dressagelove

dressagelove

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I recently posted about my lame horse, he is lame on and off, after harder work, and then becomes sound again.

so I had the vet out yesterday, and she said, as there are no signs of any trauma, no obvious strains, of in fact anything at all which would indicate the lameness, that the next step is to go in for tests. Unfortunately this would cost into the thousands, and he is not insured for vets fees, there is no way I can afford this.

So, thats it, I did not appreciate the vets attitude, it was well you come and have the tests or you have a lame horse forever, I am devastated, what if I can never ride him again!

So what do I do now, I am thinking of possibly looking down the route of acupuncture, and I am going to speak to my farrier and the vet again explaining my situation.. the vet suggested box rest, but I don't agree that is for the best, and he goes crackers on box rest. he is only mildly lame, 1 10th in a straight line, and 3 10ths on a circle..

I have been suggested that it may be navicular, which would not be good to hear,, but I have no way of finding out exactly what the problem is, so how can I best tackle it?!

I am frustrated and so upset that I may have to retire this fabulous horse, any ideas anyone?
 
I wouldnt waste money on alternative treatments until you know what it is. Your vet has been honest, he doesnt know, to find out you need tests done.
I have been in a similar situation with a youngster, she isnt insured for vets fees and went lame a few months ago. The vet gave the options of tests which would cost or rest. as rest is the cure for most lamenesses we tried that and 4 months later she has come sound.
I did have one who went lame and was insured for vets, the investigative tests cost a fortune, the cure - rest.
There is no instant cure for the majority of lamenesses but you do need to know before you can treat and as your is being ridden imo you need to know what you are dealing with
 
Could you afford to have nerve blocks done, because at least you would know where the pain was coming from. I must admit this sounds very like a friend's horse. Not massively lame and it was on and off. Given his part-arab breeding and resulting boxy hooves, a couple of us suspected navicular from the outset (he was a top level WH). A year later after a stay at Leahurst, navicular was confirmed but as you say, by that time the bills were into the thousands (and then the insurance refused to pay up, but that's a different story).
 
Think you need to have at least some tests done. My sisters horse had xrays, nerve blocks and her joints injected and as her front feet were no longer insured she had to pay but it didnt cost thousands infact the xrays alone were only about £40 a plate (which is less than i paid for my dog).!!!!

Also know of one that was lame in front went for xrays and it was due to a foot inbalance.
 
I dont think it would cost thousands tbh!! I sent my gelding for x rays as after he completed 8 weeks box rest he was even lamer. It was suspected to be Navicular as the back of his pasturn was slightly swollen and there was no other signs of injuring. We had nerve blocks, 5 x rays and a cortosone injection for about £260. Then he had to have remedial shoeing, but it was worth it as we new exactly what was wrong with him. Personally i wouldnt be riding a horse which i suspect something not to be right.
 
An investigation doesnt need to cost thousands,so i would be getting nerve blocks and xrays done.....if that failed to show up anything i would turn away for a while.
 
hayleyshep88 said:
I recently posted about my lame horse, he is lame on and off, after harder work, and then becomes sound again.

so I had the vet out yesterday, and she said, as there are no signs of any trauma, no obvious strains, of in fact anything at all which would indicate the lameness, that the next step is to go in for tests. Unfortunately this would cost into the thousands, and he is not insured for vets fees, there is no way I can afford this.

So, thats it, I did not appreciate the vets attitude, it was well you come and have the tests or you have a lame horse forever, I am devastated, what if I can never ride him again!

So what do I do now, I am thinking of possibly looking down the route of acupuncture, and I am going to speak to my farrier and the vet again explaining my situation.. the vet suggested box rest, but I don't agree that is for the best, and he goes crackers on box rest. he is only mildly lame, 1 10th in a straight line, and 3 10ths on a circle..

I have been suggested that it may be navicular, which would not be good to hear,, but I have no way of finding out exactly what the problem is, so how can I best tackle it?!

I am frustrated and so upset that I may have to retire this fabulous horse, any ideas anyone?
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If you genuinely have no money and the horse is not in constant pain, take his shoes off and throw him out for three months and then re-assess his lameness. In the meantime don't have him trimmed unless it is a welfare issue to do so, and when he comes back into work, if he does, accept the foot shape that he then has and change it at your peril!

My guess is that he has a mild collateral ligament strain which he will fix with three months with no shoes on. If his strain is worse than it seems, then he might need a properly supervised barefoot rehab but if you cannot afford that right now, start with chucking him out and seeing where you end up.

Make sure you watch to see that he does not suffer increased lameness and is happy, but other than that a bit of "neglect" could just do the trick. This is what would have been done in the days before scans and nerve blocks.


ps I think your vet has let you down a bit - your horse's lameness screams soft tissue injury in the foot and ONE nerve block to the back half of the foot would most likely confirm it, if you work him hard before the test is done and be absolutely sure to take him in lame. Bill about £150. Barefoot rehab for mildly lame horse with collateral ligament injury - cheaper than shoeing, find yourself a decent trimmer.

I see you are in Manchester, PM me if you want a North Cheshire vet who is barefoot friendly, easily accessible from M6 and VERY realistic about uninsured horses.
 
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What did you expect the vet to do??

What is the point of accupuncture if you don't know what you are treating?:confused:
Your farrier has suggested box rest - you don't want to do that either, fair enough, your choice - but you cannot complain if you turn down sensible advice.

A few nerve blocks will pin point where the problem is (foot, fetlock, knee etc). Once you know where it is you can xray or scan etc if needed. If you choose not to scan etc then at least you will know the area you are treating and your vet can make an educated guess as to what "might" be wrong. Intermittent lameness can be very hard to diagnose even for a top vet. If you have insurance it will cover investigation. If you don't then you should have an emergency fund for this sort of thing. Horses are expensive - that should not come as a surprise. They all get injured eventually:( Well mine do anyway:rolleyes:

PersonallyI think you owe the horse a diagnosis, never mind if you can ride again or not, lame = pain. Vets are not miracle workers and can only treat what they have diagnosed. I do not understand your problem to be honest.
 
I sympathise having had a similar problem with my girl on and off since last Sept. Intermittent lameness (1/10th) took her to Somerford twice, where she trotted up sound even after lunging and flexion tests. Decided to have a full thermal body image done by Claire at www.theinnerpicture.com and that showed heat in her front left heel. Claire didn't want to know anything about my horse until after we'd talked through the results.

Went back to Somerford with image, they nerve blocked her heal and she went sound.

Not quite the end of the story but we had a starting point which is what you seem to need. I would certainly recommend Claire and have had her back again since.

Good luck with your horse.
 
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thanks u lot,,

misst - obviously i care about my horse being in pain, i am not heartless, but to be honest, he does not seem in much pain, it is just slight lameness which obviously stops me riding him, but i honestly dont think he would care, hes a get on and do it kind of chap...

also, some people seem to think i am riding him at the moment, of course i am not while he is lame....

i do think most of you are right however and getting some tests done may be the only option, as the lameness keeps coming back, there is obviously something underlying,,, will have to have a chat to our vet and see what prices they can do, because the way she was talking yesterday she actually said 'thousands' to me, which obviously is going to scare an un-insured person!
 
I agree with most of what has been said here. You owe it to your horse to try to get to the bottom of this problem. Why don't you ask the vet to give you a detailed breakdown of how much each part of the investigation costs so that at least you can be prepared. It will not cost thousands. The only thing that does cost a fortune is MRI and you dont have to have this done if you cant afford it. MRI shows up soft tissue damage (e.g. collateral ligament damage) but conditions such as navicular can be diagnosed via Xray - much cheaper. Any suspected soft tissue damage can be helped/dealt with via rest if you cant afford treatments - you can do what Cptrayes says and turn the horse away without shoes for a few months and then assess him.
You never know, it could be something simple - wouldnt you like to put your mind at rest??
 
Have to agree with the turn out suggestion, if he is no better in 3-4 months then you can go down the investigative route. I dont know what your livery situation is but if you can save some money whilst he is turned away you can put that towards some diagnostic work if he gets no better.

You are also coming into the best time of year to not have to worry about him being out 24\7 and there is nothing quite like a bit of Dr Green.

Best of luck with him and hope it all works out well for you :)
 
most vets will start with nerve blocks to locate the area then investigate. having had a horse with same level of lameness we would never have resolved it or diagnosed cause without investigation . speak to another vet in the meantime i would turn out on restricted area ,2 stables sized and rest.
 
OP in your shoes I would not go for xrays. For a start, abnormalities on the navicular bone bears very little correlation with how lame a horse is. More than one vet has told me that if you xray a big yard of 100 horses, around half the horses will show navicular changes but very few of those will be lame. You could be scared for no reason. For a second, dissection of dead horses and MRI of live ones has shown that "navicular" starts with damage to the deep digital flexor tendon, and the damage to the navicular bone follows after. So early in the disease the pain is almost always soft tissue, not bone related. Lastly, the other biggest cause of navicular spectrum disorders is collateral ligament damage, often caused by unbalanced feet. In other words, xrays will not actually help you get your horse any better unless they show that your farrier has his shoes unbalanced in relation to his bones, which is possible. For that, you need xrays with the shoes on, whereas for navicular xrays they are normally taken off.

What does have a great result is to get the horse's shoes off and get it into a heel first landing. Look carefully at your horse's movement on a hard flat surface - video and watch in slow motion if you can. If it is landing toe first, you have an obvious cause of the difficulties you are having. If you can get some help (from a barefoot friendly farrier or a trimmer, preferably with experience of similar horses) to get him heel first landing then there is a good build-up of case studies which now that indicate that he will probably come sound. Whether you will then want, or be able, to shoe again is another question for another day.

If you want to see the rehab that I did last year, he is not far from you and I would be happy to show you him. PM me.
 
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If he was my horse and he had been lame on and off for a few months then I would have the lameness workup done. I wouldnt waste money on alternative treatments yet as you dont know what you are treating. I cant see what other option you have really apart from chucking him out for a few months as cptrayes suggested.
A lameness workup shouldnt cost thousands, maybe with the treatment for possible Navicular it could but finding out what is wrong shouldnt. Id ring the practice first and ask how much worse case scenario for a full lameness workup and go from there.
Good luck, I hope everything works out for you
 
cptrayes said:
More than one vet has told me that if you xray a big yard of 100 horses, around half the horses will show navicular changes but very few of those will be lame. You could be scared for no reason. For a second, dissection of dead horses and MRI of live ones has shown that "navicular" starts with damage to the deep digital flexor tendon, and the damage to the navicular bone follows after. So early in the disease the pain is almost always soft tissue, not bone related.
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That is so interesting. My friends horse has just been diagnosed with both these. I never knew they were connected. Thank you
 
cptrayes said:
OP in your shoes I would not go for xrays. For a start, abnormalities on the navicular bone bears very little correlation with how lame a horse is. More than one vet has told me that if you xray a big yard of 100 horses, around half the horses will show navicular changes but very few of those will be lame. You could be scared for no reason. For a second, dissection of dead horses and MRI of live ones has shown that "navicular" starts with damage to the deep digital flexor tendon, and the damage to the navicular bone follows after. So early in the disease the pain is almost always soft tissue, not bone related. Lastly, the other biggest cause of navicular spectrum disorders is collateral ligament damage, often caused by unbalanced feet. In other words, xrays will not actually help you get your horse any better unless they show that your farrier has his shoes unbalanced in relation to his bones, which is possible. For that, you need xrays with the shoes on, whereas for navicular xrays they are normally taken off.

What does have a great result is to get the horse's shoes off and get it into a heel first landing. Look carefully at your horse's movement on a hard flat surface - video and watch in slow motion if you can. If it is landing toe first, you have an obvious cause of the difficulties you are having. If you can get some help (from a barefoot friendly farrier or a trimmer, preferably with experience of similar horses) to get him heel first landing then there is a good build-up of case studies which now that indicate that he will probably come sound. Whether you will then want, or be able, to shoe again is another question for another day.

If you want to see the rehab that I did last year, he is not far from you and I would be happy to show you him. PM me.
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This^^^ Sound advice could save you alot of money!!!
 
Unfortunately this would cost into the thousands, and he is not insured for vets fees, there is no way I can afford this.
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Of course further tests are the next logical step. These will include nerve blocks and possible x-rays, which will cost around £500. Costs which should not break the bank.
 
Orrr you could do what i did, and that was spend £2500 on expensive treatments and MRI and only to have a lamer horse at the end of it!!!!!!!!!!!!! he was insured (although i paid half MRI). In the end he was rehabbed at Rockley (i paid as was out of insurance)and i now have a sound happy horse and it only took 4 months before he went hunting for the first time in 2 years. He has just been to x-country camp, and is as sound as you like. He does everything a shod horse does. I would go with Cptrays, sound advice in every way.x

He was unsound 2/10th on circle for 2 years, while he was investigated!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
OP my previous horse had something similar, minor lamenesses that would appear and stay for a few days or weeks then disappear, sometimes for months, and in between she evented at BE90, without problems. Only sign there was something wrong while she was 'sound' was that she'd chip in extra strides in front of fences quite often, and struggled with right canter on hard ground.

Routine scans found nothing except fluid in one pastern and a windgall, but subsequent investigation showed the windgall was actually tendon fluid and bone debris, and she had a 2 yo puncture to the tendon which had basically been getting progressively worse, but was being supported by the fluid. Before we knew this we'd drained the fluid, and had 3 months of her being bolder than ever, before she broke down at the end of her first affiliated DC. We think the fluid caused a sort of throbbing ache which would catch her every now and then, and prevented her from working that leg too hard. With the fluid gone she felt better than ever and stopped protecting it, so the injury basically fell to pieces. I can't remember how much all the investigation cost, we too weren't insured but had savings set aside for the horses. It wasn't in the 1000s though.

The one, cost-free, indication that it was a serious long term injury requiring investigation was when my farrier spotted uneven wear in her shoes, suggesting she'd been sparing one leg. I'd get yourself to the best farrier you can find, someone you trust, and get their opinion over the space of several months, if expensive scans are out of the question.
 
Agree with the shoes off and turn out method, although getting a nerve block to the back of the foot would not hurt to confirm 'heel pain'.

Three yrs ago my mare had intermittent lameness, was insured and (perhaps rogue) vet went nuts with diagnoses and ran up bills close to 15k on 3 claims. MRI showed collateral ligament strain, and other soft tissue damage. Vets treatment was more box rest and remedial shoeing. After a while I took shoes off and retired her to the field; a year later I was tempted to try a trimmer, and now a year on from that I have a sound, heel first landing mare back in work with my friends daughter. Farrier trims her now (although not very often as she keeps her feet down herself) and her feet are unconventional shapes to say the least, but she is sound and her action straighter than it has ever been. You have nothing to lose tbh!
 
Taking shoes off and turning out is a great idea but what if the horse is a really good doer (more weight could add to problems) and if the horse has got flat feet so feels every little bit of uneven ground?

Thanks
 
I think you have to ask your vet if it will do harm if turned out for six to eight weeks, barefoot if possible, but get farrier to check feet and walk every two weeks, to see if there is any improvement or otherwise.
Then you can start to work up to see if the lameness is improving.
Re Navicular, note that once this was diagnosed as Navicular, a condition which tended to be pretty much .. well very bad news, now it is "navicular syndrome", a series of conditions, different symptoms and outcomes, you need to read up a bit more and become more knowledgeable about your own horse, not an expert like your vet, but skilled enough to check horse at the walk (being led by someone) on a hard surface, ask the farrier for his opinion. also check the legs every day so you can identify any change.
 
'I did not appreciate the vets attitude, it was well you come and have the tests or you have a lame horse forever, I am devastated, what if I can never ride him again!'
Well that is the situation essentially..
Nerve blocks and x-rays if neccessar + ultrasound scans should could to less than 500, nerve blocks alone to less than 200. Not much to pay to try and sort out the problem.
As for CPtrayes doling out advice having never seen the horse on what it could be (there are many other ligaments that could be involved) and how to treat it... I think anyone who tries to diagnose a lame horse without seeing it, well...that tells you all you need to know about taking their advice!
I think you need to seriously look at things. Your horse may be lame irrevocably, it is not impossible if he has a degenerative change going on. He may not be, but the liklihood is that treatment will either be expensive, or involve rest and bute.
So if you want, you oculd box rest for a month on bute and see what happens, as the vet says. Don't be surprised though if there is no change though.
 
I told the poster what I would do with the horse if it was mine. And in my previous post I listed the most likely causes of the symptoms that she has described with her horse. Those are the most likely diagnosis she will get from an intermittently forelimb lame horse which is lamer on a circle and only lame after hard work - unbalanced feet, ddft injury, collateral ligament injury. There are thousands more possibles, of course, but those are the most likely at the moment.

How likely is the horse to be "lame irrevocably", in your opinion, given that it is not currently even lame consistently, and when it is lame it is so little lame that the vet feels a nerve block will be inaffective? I'm not sure that bit was posted, to be fair to you, the OP told me it in a PM, but I do think it is a shame that you would scare someone with a mildly lame horse by suggesting that their horse will never be sound again, when that's very unlikely.

This OP has been let down by a Vet who has thrown his toys out of his pram by refusing to do ANY diagnostic work unless she is prepared to spend, to quote him "thousands of pounds". How ridiculous, not to mention unprofessional, is that when a nerve block will cost around £75 - 100?

And yet you think she should take this vet's advice. I don't, I think she should get nerve blocks done with a more reasonable vet. But if she truly cannot afford that, (and we have no idea what her situation is as regards money, for all we know she could just have been made redundant) then what - shoot it now? I think turning it out for 3 months is probably preferable, don't you?
 
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Everybody has different opinions and thats fine, but at the end of the day it is my situation, and if I cannot afford the fees the vet is quoting me, thers not a lot I can do about that other than win the lottery!

It is all well and good for a lot of the posters here saying go and get the tests done, obviously, I am not simple, that would be the best thing to do, I would love to do that, but I spoke to the vet again yesterday to reiterate my problems, and see if we could do basic tests (xrays, nerve blocks) and she still maintained that the minimum it would be is £800.

Some of you may be convinced that vets are the be all and end all, but I have had a great deal of experience with vets and I'm afraid I am finding many of the to be ruthless money grabbers, not all of them obviously, maybe I should think of trying a different vet!

The aim of my post was not to complain about vets, but to see if anyone had any OTHER ideas I could try, such as the barefoot idea, which I am currently looking into, I am a great believer in the natural way...
 
hayleyshep88 said:
It is all well and good for a lot of the posters here saying go and get the tests done, obviously, I am not simple, that would be the best thing to do, I would love to do that, but I spoke to the vet again yesterday to reiterate my problems, and see if we could do basic tests (xrays, nerve blocks) and she still maintained that the minimum it would be is £800.
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Then find another vet - as they are over charging.

Good luck. I hope you find the answers you are looking for, and more importantly so does your horse.
 
Tiffany said:
Taking shoes off and turning out is a great idea but what if the horse is a really good doer (more weight could add to problems) and if the horse has got flat feet so feels every little bit of uneven ground?

Thanks
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You could look at forms of hoof support other than shoes - hoof boots are great, but not really designed for full-time use (although two of mine have worn them for an extended period each to deal with specific problems), or there are these hoof-cast things, which I think are a kind of plaster-cast, although not as rigid.
Look at a track system for the weight issue - Jaime Jackson's 'Paddock Paradise' book is great, although a little off the wall in places!
 
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