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  Discussion on Huge abscess. Long post.
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Member:
Sefiroth

Posted on Sunday, Jan 25, 2004 - 3:06 pm:

This is probably going to be quite long but I want to make sure I get all the details in.

Yet again Golly, my Percheron gelding, has found a way to run up my vet bill. He's the one I've discussed elsewhere on this site about possible fibrotic myopathy vs. EPSM. He was diagnosed with EPSM via biopsy. He's been on the high fat diet since the end of October. He used to get 2 qts strategy, 1 qt alfalfa pellets, 1 qt dried beet pulp, two cups corn oil, and a vit E and selenium supplement twice a day.

The end of last month a friend offered to board him at her place at half the price I was paying at my current place. So we moved him over. Within a few days she called to let me know that he's been eating very very slowly. He'd take over an hour to eat his meal. Sometimes he'd not finish at all. So we cut back on the corn oil more and more to see if his appetite would pick back up. It didn’t.

After being at the new place one and a half to two weeks, he began severely hiking his left hind. Previously he'd been having problems with the right hind that lead to the EPSM diagnosis. At first I thought it was the EPSM flaring up since he's not been getting the correct amount of fat. I talked to the vet I work for, describing his way of moving. He said it sounded sort of like upward fixation of the patella. The hike didn’t happen at every step and seemed to get better the more he moved. He also lifted and lowered the leg while standing.

Two days after talking to my vet, I went out to visit him again and what did I find? A HUGE abscess had popped out at coronary band of the left hind. He was still hiking the left hind, but would otherwise walk normally on it. I cleaned up his foot, put some betadine, and then some icthamol on it. I gave him some bute and left instructions for this treatment to continue. The barn owners called and let me know that now, after the bute was started his appetite picked back up again. So I scheduled an appointment for my vet to come out and see if there was something going on with his mouth and to check the left hind foot and leg.

I wasn’t able to be there when the vet checked Golly over, but he didn’t feel or hear any clicking of the patella on the left hind and he floated his teeth. The next day at work I asked him what he thought and he said he felt the left hind leg hiking was due to shivers which was related to the EPSM, aggravated by the extra cold snap we were having (-20 with the wind chill), his thin condition (since he was eating so slow he apparently wasn’t receiving his full ration at the old place), and the stress of the abscess. His teeth had some hooks and edges on him that he filed down, but wasn’t able to do quite as good a job as he wanted since Golly takes quite a bit of dormosedan (I think he said he gave 1.3cc) to sedate well enough since no one else was around to watch him recover. He didn’t get too good a look at the abscess since it was quite gunked up with draining pus.

Two days later I went out again to see how he was doing and DrOp off some more bute (he goes through a 12g tube of paste pretty quick!) The barn help had just finished cleaning up his foot and I was able to get a good look at the abscess. It was HUGE! About 4 inches long, 1 inch wide at its widest and 1/2 deep or so. It took out most of the coronary band at the toe. I was going to get pictures today but we're having a lovely ice storm at the moment here in southern Illinois.

So now that I've typed all the details I can think of here's my questions:

1. Is my vet's theory about the left hind leg problems being due to shivers sound? Or can this just be a reaction to the abscess? The horse was never non-weight bearing on his left hind, nor showed any other signs of lameness, just the hike that started about 3-4 days before the abscess blew. And is currently continuing but to a much lesser degree since the abscess blew.

2. With so much of the coronary band involved, will his foot grow back normal? I know it’s hard to say with out looking, but I'll hopefully get some pictures posted this Thursday.
Moderator:
DrO

Posted on Monday, Jan 26, 2004 - 8:15 am:

Without looking at the horse it is impossible to comment on whether the gait change could be abscsees related. But fix the abscess and if the gait returns to normal, you have your answer. Yes with a simple gravel once healed the new horn will grow out normal.
DrO
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