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Location: MN | I have a question for those who have HAD horses with Kissing Spine and have had surgery or know someone DIRECTLY that has. I just don't want rude opinions. Long story short, mu horse had surgery last week on 6 different areas that were overlapping, he will need 3 weeks off, and 3 weeks of light lunging and ponying before I can ride again. Anyone else had a horse come back to barrel racing full throttle after this? |
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 Midget Lover
  
Location: Kentucky | My mare has KS, but I did not elect for the surgery. She's 19, not a good investment. We did back injections in October and she is still going strong. I gave her a month off before legging her back up. I have ran her a few times since then and it makes the world of difference. I do not regret my decision and if she needs injections again, I'll gladly do it.
Here was her x-ray:
Edited by Murphy 2016-03-29 1:44 PM
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 Veteran
Posts: 158
| Can I ask what symptoms your horses were showing that made you look into it? |
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 Not Afraid to Work
Posts: 4717
| Interested in responses... my gelding was diagnosed with "mild" KS. I am not sure I am 100% on board just cased on the fact that his aren't actually touching. He took a bad spill and came up back sore about a month later. Never had a sore back a day in his life prior to that fall.
I am going to try and attach my x-ray |
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Not Afraid to Work
Posts: 4717
| snoopy - 2016-03-29 1:18 PM
I have a question for those who have HAD horses with Kissing Spine and have had surgery or know someone DIRECTLY that has. I just don't want rude opinions. Long story short, mu horse had surgery last week on 6 different areas that were overlapping, he will need 3 weeks off, and 3 weeks of light lunging and ponying before I can ride again. Anyone else had a horse come back to barrel racing full throttle after this?
Where did you have the surgery done? |
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Midget Lover
Location: Kentucky | gunner07 - 2016-03-29 2:49 PM Can I ask what symptoms your horses were showing that made you look into it?
My mare had quite a few, and it was about a 6-8 month long process for me to diagnose her. Went through 3 vets before finally going to Rood and Riddle. They figured it out in less than an hour.
She would crow-hop/buck before turning a barrel, wouldn't catch her leads while loping, reluctance to work, no rhythm to her trot/jog, and was very moody. She would also almost collapse when I would cinch her up. Everything pointed towards ulcers, and I treated her with GastroGuard and with THE. That did help, as she was having loose stools. I think the pain just flared the ulcers.
She's a different horse since the diagnosis. No issues now. |
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Not Afraid to Work
Posts: 4717
| Murphy - 2016-03-29 1:57 PM
gunner07 - 2016-03-29 2:49 PM Can I ask what symptoms your horses were showing that made you look into it?
My mare had quite a few, and it was about a 6-8 month long process for me to diagnose her. Went through 3 vets before finally going to Rood and Riddle. They figured it out in less than an hour.
She would crow-hop/buck before turning a barrel, wouldn't catch her leads while loping, reluctance to work, no rhythm to her trot/jog, and was very moody. She would also almost collapse when I would cinch her up. Everything pointed towards ulcers, and I treated her with GastroGuard and with THE. That did help, as she was having loose stools. I think the pain just flared the ulcers.
She's a different horse since the diagnosis. No issues now.
My gelding was back sore and super tight in his lumbar area. He was incredibly cinchy but as far as behavior, he was fine. He picked up leads, used his hind end, worked his pattern fine... I had to ask the vet to x-ray him because when I asked about ulcers he was certain it wasn't ulcers.
My gelding is pretty minimal... in the grand scheme of things. No touching but they have hit... as there is a resurfacing of the bone (white on x-ray) on both sides of 2 vertebrae's and 1 side of 1. |
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 Expert
Posts: 1440
Location: Texas | I HAVE has 2 horses with KS that I did the surgery on. One had 2 areas and the other had 3. I will say both of them has 90 days/3 months off before any legging up. 6 weeks seems very short to me. Both had the invasive type of surgery and not just the ligament release surgery. |
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 Owner of a ratting catting machine
Posts: 2258
| barrelbasher - 2016-03-29 2:31 PM
I HAVE has 2 horses with KS that I did the surgery on. One had 2 areas and the other had 3. I will say both of them has 90 days/3 months off before any legging up. 6 weeks seems very short to me. Both had the invasive type of surgery and not just the ligament release surgery.
I agree with barrelbasher. 6 weeks doesn't sound like nearly enough time for something so sensitive as a spine.
I had a very bad case operated on, it was the best thing I ever did for him. He got four months off, two months of very slow legging up. Life happened and he ended up having a full year off after that. I legged him up slowly last spring, he came back to run some really good 1D local, 2D nationally times before I retired him last fall from nasty SI arthritis and pain.
My best advice on KS horses is, once you have the surgery done and bring them back, be very aware of pain symptoms elsewhere. If the KS was really bothering them, it was a mask for other issues they might be having.
Edited by classicpotatochip 2016-03-29 3:03 PM
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Elite Veteran
Posts: 926
| classicpotatochip - 2016-03-29 3:01 PM
barrelbasher - 2016-03-29 2:31 PM
I HAVE has 2 horses with KS that I did the surgery on. One had 2 areas and the other had 3. I will say both of them has 90 days/3 months off before any legging up. 6 weeks seems very short to me. Both had the invasive type of surgery and not just the ligament release surgery.
I agree with barrelbasher. 6 weeks doesn't sound like nearly enough time for something so sensitive as a spine.
I had a very bad case operated on, it was the best thing I ever did for him. He got four months off, two months of very slow legging up. Life happened and he ended up having a full year off after that. I legged him up slowly last spring, he came back to run some really good 1D local, 2D nationally times before I retired him last fall from nasty SI arthritis and pain.
My best advice on KS horses is, once you have the surgery done and bring them back, be very aware of pain symptoms elsewhere. If the KS was really bothering them, it was a mask for other issues they might be having.
Good point. Another thing is, as the chiro vet mentioned, if they've had KS, they have been overcompensating, possibly for quite some time, so other areas are going to be sore from that.
My gelding had KS surgery 12/2, no riding for 4 months, so I can start to ride this weekend. We've been lunging for about 2 weeks now, just loped the other day.
Not sure what type of surgery the original poster had, but that sure seems like way too short of time to be off one. Maybe it was a different, less invasive procedure. Mine was stall only with hand walking for 3 weeks, small pen for another month before he even got out in the pasture. I had Cliff Honnas in Bryan do mine. He does about 3 procedures a week. He says his rate of return to performance is up in the 90%.
As far as how did I know, mine started with just getting anxious in the alley, then getting anxious when he was saddled at the race, and finally getting anxious with the trailer being hooked up. He was normally way quiet, and I knew something was wrong. Luckily I have an awesome lameness vet close and he caught it immediately. Then I had a secong opinion. After that I went through 2 sessions of conservative therapy cuz they didn't want to go straight to surgery. I knew in my heart it was a surgery case, but vets were reluctant to do the surgery. Treat, rest, try to ride try to run....repeat....spent about 18 months doing that.
Good luck to all those dealing with this.
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 Expert
Posts: 1591
Location: East Texas | My gelding is scheduled to have surgery next Tuesday at Dr Honnas. He was trying so hard to work, but leaving a barrel he would run off and be scared to death when I got him stopped. I took him into my vet who is friends with Honnas and he was so sore that when you ran your hand down his back he almost fell down. This horse had a rodeo record but the previous rider and beat him pretty bad in the alley so I got him knowing he had issues, just not that he has KS. I chose not to do a vet check but it is what it is, I'll fix him and bring him back. Honnas told me it would be four months off before I could ride him. I retired my 18yo last year due to KS, he suddenly became a dirty bucker. I chose to just retire him because he owed me nothing, and he can live out his years here. |
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Expert
Posts: 1258
Location: MN | I had my horses surgery done in Ames at the University, she told me 6 weeks, but he will be checked before I ride, he had 6 areas operated on, level 3 out of 4, he is doing great, I appreciate your input, he will be off as long as it takes |
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Elite Veteran
Posts: 926
| snoopy - 2016-03-29 7:42 PM
I had my horses surgery done in Ames at the University, she told me 6 weeks, but he will be checked before I ride, he had 6 areas operated on, level 3 out of 4, he is doing great, I appreciate your input, he will be off as long as it takes
What procedure did your horse have? There are several, and it may have been different from what Honnas has....however, any surgery like this, I'd suggest being extra careful.
Honnas goes in and remodels the spine, it is very invasive and thus requires the 4 months. Maybe you had something else done? |
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 Mature beyond Years
Posts: 10780
Location: North of the 49th Parallel | I have a mare that shows every sign of having KS.... except when we went to go xray, there were no changes and everything looked fine. So we are injecting SI instead and if that fails, I'll just breed her. |
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Elite Veteran
Posts: 1165
Location: California | My made was diagnosed with kissing spine last September/November. That vet told me she would never run barrels again. After already being out so much money I could not afford injections for her back and front left foot (coffin joint inflammation). We did 5 days of bite and muscle relaxers, did recommended stretches, and massaged her back daily. Bought her a PHT MagnaCu sheet a month later for dirt cheap. Sent her xrays to the kissing spine expert here in Texas, Dr Honnas i think it is. He told me she was a mild case and not to do surgery. He said there was no reason she couldnt go back to barrel racing once the inflammation in her back was taken care of and i take measures to prevent further issues. It took months to pinpoint her front end lameness. Now that all that is figured out she is back to running barrels! She gets her PHT sheet before I ride and after and I constantly palpate her back! |
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Expert
Posts: 1258
Location: MN | My vet basically went in and cut out the bone that was rubbing or overlapping and created the correct amount of space, she did this with local anesthetic, and it went very well. If he needs 4 months, it's fine, because I know now he was miserable, he was a level 4 out of 5, and there were 6 areas she worked on |
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Boot Detective
Posts: 1900
| I had one that had surgery and recovered and made a huge improvement. She was stalled and hand walked for 3-4 weeks, moved to a small 12x36 run for another month and then started to light exercise via ponying her. It took about 4 months before she could be saddled and rode because it took that long for the incision to heal and hair over. We tried sooner but it rubbed it raw and we had to give her more time to heal.
I think KS is over diagnosed. I'll just leave that there. I also think if they truly have bones rubbing bones, the humane thing to do is surgery or retirement. Bones rubbing bones has to be very painful and a needle can't change that.
Mine would buck after turning a barrel. Her hocks were sore from compensating and her lower back muscles were super tight and sore. |
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Elite Veteran
Posts: 1165
Location: California | quickdraw - 2016-03-31 10:51 PM
I had one that had surgery and recovered and made a huge improvement. She was stalled and hand walked for 3-4 weeks, moved to a small 12x36 run for another month and then started to light exercise via ponying her. It took about 4 months before she could be saddled and rode because it took that long for the incision to heal and hair over. We tried sooner but it rubbed it raw and we had to give her more time to heal.
I think KS is over diagnosed. I'll just leave that there. I also think if they truly have bones rubbing bones, the humane thing to do is surgery or retirement. Bones rubbing bones has to be very painful and a needle can't change that.
Mine would buck after turning a barrel. Her hocks were sore from compensating and her lower back muscles were super tight and sore.
If its bone rubbing bone due to inflammation then yes a needle or other rehab approaches can help. Its a case to case basis. Most the time ks horses also have another lameness issue. By getting that figured out and the inflammation through the back under control quite a few horses can go back to their performance careers as long as preventative measures are taken and you know your horse. My vet and I have a great working relationship and he has no issue checking her out at a moments notice if I feel something is off.
If the ks is severe then no, a needle will not stop bone on bone rubbing. Dr Honnas does ks surgeries in Texas and many here told me he's one of the best, that is how he explained it all to me. |
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