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Discussion on Summer Pasture RAO, respiratory bacterial infection or IAD?
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Member:
Lindsey
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Posted on Friday, Aug 18, 2006 - 10:20 pm:
Dear Dr O and members,
I would really appreciate some of your thoughts on this.
For about 10 days now, my one horse has had a seriously increased respiration rate, even when at rest. Basically at all times! He can hardly be exercised because he is immediately out of breath. He even starts sweating when at rest, from putting in an effort to breathe. At times he looses interest in feed and hay, because he appears to be putting all effort in breathing, and it looks to me as if he's starting to loose weight.
No heave-line visible however, just rapid breathing and extremely flared nostrils. Vet said no abnormal lung sounds to be heard and his temperature is stable at 100.2F At the onset of the breathing problems he stocked up on his hinds for 2 days, which is very unusual for him as he never stocked up in his life before.
Vet came out twice this week, did blood work, Lyme test, which came back negative.
He has no cough and until tonight had no nasal discharge.
The vet suspected it to be late summer pasture RAO and has put him on Prednisolone and Ventipulmin.
However tonight for the first time after a very short walk under the saddle, he started pouring with milky white stuff from his one nostril.
What could this mean? I thought that RAO, only produced either no discharge or only clear discharge.
Could it be that he is having either an inflammatory airway problem or a bacterial respiratory infection?
How could I have this diagnosed. Does he need to be scoped for that?
And am I correct in thinking a bacterial infection needs a different treatment then RAO or IAD?
It's Friday night, so not much more I can do right now, but I will ring my vet back first thing Monday morning.
Suppose it is bacterial, is there any harm in continuing to give him the Prednisolone and Ventipulmin syrup over the weekend?
And if it were to be bacterial is that infectious? Reason being, my other horse started showing some breathing difficulty too with a heave-line for a couple of hours just after coming in from pasture in the morning, which then goes away again whilst stalled during the day. He's also got a slight exercise intolerance right now, which I'm not used to have with him. We have put him on inhaled Flovent and Albuterol.
Very many thanks for any thoughts.
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Moderator:
DrO
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Posted on Saturday, Aug 19, 2006 - 8:31 am:
That would be correct, this stuff pouring from the nostril is not likely to be related to RAO. Without knowing what this is (purulence or foamy saliva come to mind first) it is hard to judge whether you should change therapy and should be done by consulting your vet at least on the phone and if there are any serious alterations in the horses vital signs (see Diseases of Horses » First Aid » Taking Temperature, Pulse, and Respiration) the horse should be seen today.
It will require an examination of the fluid and then a scope to determine what this is and where it is coming from before a diagnosis can be made. The fact that it was just one side suggests an upper respiratory origin.
DrO
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Member:
Lindsey
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Posted on Saturday, Aug 19, 2006 - 9:16 am:
OK, I see. I will try to ring my vet today then. It did not look like foamy saliva, so I guess it may not be all that good. 
Thank you very much for your reply.
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