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 Extreme Veteran
Posts: 332
 
| One of our good mares has a splint on her lower cannon bone. She has arthritis in her knee on the same leg. We took her to the vet, and it was recommended that we retire her to light riding. This is fine if is what needs to be done, but we are going to a lameness vet for a second opinion. The first vet does not deal with a lot of lameness issues, at all.
Our appointment is next monday, but curiosity has me wondering if this is something that will cripple her or if there are ways to deal with this.
We do not want to cause this mare to break down, as i stated will retire if need be. Just wondering if there is hope that she will ever run again or if she will only be light riding sound...
Has anyone else successfully dealt with this? |
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 Veteran
Posts: 129
Location: South | I had a barrel horse that started in her later teens having arthritis in her knee. I took her to several Vets and all told me to inject the joint. I did and the injection lasted about 4-6 months. After the initial injection it only got worse. Especially when I was hauling/running her hard. After fooling with this about 8-10 months, I officially retired her and she was noticeably better within a few months of being off and no riding. This was about 3 years ago when this all happened, and she doesn't limp at all now and the knee is just puffy 24/7. She is so much happier now and is able to stay out all the time. This was just my experience with knee issue. After this issue, I'll never inject the knee again. |
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 Elite Veteran
Posts: 928
Location: Northern CA | Had a mare with a knee that wasn't straight, got to the point where the bone formation was visually obvious. Although the range of motion was limited, the knee never seemed to cause her pain. However, the knee did cause problems lower in the leg. Her cannon bone actually remodeled itself and became quite thicker on the lateral side above the fetlock, she ended up with bone spurs in the fetlock, no doubt a cause of the unbalance, and navicular problems. I am unsure if the navicular was related or not. |
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 Hog Tie My Mojo
Posts: 4847
Location: Opelousas, LA | Just see what the lameness vet says, it will depend on how bad the arthritis is and how lame she is now. I would not hesitate to inject the knee and put her on Adequan or Pentosan/Glucosamine and keep using her if it is at all possible. BOT products are also awesome for arthritic joints. She may do fine with maintenance, she may not but I would sure give it a shot, there are lots of horses competing successfully with arthritis in a joint |
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The Advice Guru
Posts: 6419
 
| It all depends on how much you are willing to spend.
There is the IRAP, and PRP injections
True stem cells
There has also been a drug company making sheets of cartilage and small animal vets have been using the sheets in joints to replace the cartilage and have had success. My equine vet has been looking into this |
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