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Regular
Posts: 95
Location: North Dakota | First time broodmare owner....already pulling my hair out.
Wondering if anybody has any advice or tricks that can help us out. The mare foaled Friday morning around 6am. Of course, we weren't out there until about 7 30. Baby was born a little bit of a dummy foal, assuming it was a hard birth. She was weak and unable to stay standing and wouldn't latch onto momma. Took her into the vet, where she administered fluids and antibiotics. She kept her over night to see if she could get her going any more. She tried a "foal squeeze" on her and baby jumped up right away afterwards and latched on to the mare and has had a will to live since then. Next day, we went ahead and did a plasma transfusion. That night, joints started swelling. Took her back into the vet where she DMSO/Furazone wrapped the back legs and started a stronger round of antibiotics. Went out early this morning to unwrap and the infection blew out of her umbilical cord. Back to the vet... She tied it off and clipped the excess umbilical.. baby's not dehydrated, has a low fever (102.5), is eating off of her momma, chewing on hay, pooping, and peeing fine.... Now what? Anything more I can do to keep the infection away from the umbilical cord? Anything I can do to draw the infection out? Baby is up and playing with mom and they are in a warm dry stall with heat lamps up.
Thanks! |
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Elite Veteran
Posts: 915
 
Location: SE KS | No advice, keep up the good work & care!!! |
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 Shelter Dog Lover
Posts: 10277
| No advice but prayers for your baby!!! |
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 Hog Tie My Mojo
Posts: 4847
Location: Opelousas, LA | I bet she needs surgery to remove the navel. Our TB filly had to have that done last week and they ended up taking part of the bladder out too. Sounds like the infection is already up inside of her if she has a bit of a fever. What does her bloodwork look like?
Ours wasn't sick, had no fever and just a slightly elevated white count. We elected to get agressive and do the surgery to lessen the chance of a joint infection and I am glad we did, she had a pretty extensive infection.
Edited by Barnmom 2016-04-26 3:50 PM
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The Advice Guru
Posts: 6419
| I would be keeping on antibiotics for atleast a week, you can give children's human penicillin or amoxicillin orally to baby foals, it is easy the vet I believe just has to call in a prescription to the pharmacy.
I would also be giving a stomach soother sucrelate (sp) is what I used years ago.
After the antibiotics are done I give a bit of probiotics (I use biotic 8 1/4 scoop and make it liquid)
Hang in there
You can also iodine the umbilical cord |
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Regular
Posts: 95
Location: North Dakota | Yep, she'll be on antibiotics for six more days. Her umbilical cord actually extended out of her body, where I think most stay in even if they are infected (I could be completely wrong on this). My vet went ahead and tied off at the top and cut the excess off. She's still peeing normally, instead of it coming through her umbilical cord so I'm praying at this time surgery won't be necessary. Sounds like we are on the right track though! Thanks for the input guys! Update on baby.. She's strong enough to kick while we are doctoring her!! Still putting up a huge fight!! Yay! |
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 My Heart Be Happy
Posts: 9159
Location: Arkansas | Prayers for your baby and for you, cause I can only imagine how stressed you are. Please let us know how things are going |
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Regular
Posts: 95
Location: North Dakota | UPDATE ON BABY
Your prayers are working! THANK YOU!!!
Baby is still full of sass! And lots of it!!! The swelling is 100 percent gone in all four legs! I was able to leave the wraps off all day today with no swelling coming back!! Going to DMSO/Furazone wrap tonight and take off in the morning just to be sure nothing comes back. Her umbilical cord is nickel sized with NO drainage!!! Poop is solidifying more and more every day! Peeing out of the correct hole!
God is so good! She's a fighter and we have been very blessed with this miracle baby. Not out of the woods yet, but one step closer! Thanks again!!! |
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 A Somebody to Everybody
Posts: 41354
Location: Under The Big Sky Of Texas | RidinRank - 2016-04-27 7:05 PM UPDATE ON BABY Your prayers are working! THANK YOU!!! Baby is still full of sass! And lots of it!!! The swelling is 100 percent gone in all four legs! I was able to leave the wraps off all day today with no swelling coming back!! Going to DMSO/Furazone wrap tonight and take off in the morning just to be sure nothing comes back. Her umbilical cord is nickel sized with NO drainage!!! Poop is solidifying more and more every day! Peeing out of the correct hole! God is so good! She's a fighter and we have been very blessed with this miracle baby. Not out of the woods yet, but one step closer! Thanks again!!!
Awesome news  |
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My Heart Be Happy
Posts: 9159
Location: Arkansas | I hope this little spitfire has a very special name!!!!
So thrilled He is keeping His hand on her. . . |
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Regular
Posts: 95
Location: North Dakota | Update on baby! We've decided to register her as "Eyesa Special Diva" if it's available (Eyesa Texas Hero, Special Effort bred).. We've been calling her Diva! Received terrible news yesterday while I was getting groceries.. Vet thought she could be going into kidney failure.. Kidney enzymes were elevated and protein was very, very low. We needed to get surgery done as she had started peeing through her umbilical cord yesterday morning. Unfortunately, with the bad bloodwork, we would have lost her during surgery from the anesthesia. Vet decided that there was no way that she would survive without surgery.. Went ahead with surgery under a very strong local (to numb the area) and heavy sedation. She pulled through!!!! Made it through the night and although is pretty sore today, she is perky and eating away!! Just got word, that her enzyme AND protein levels are within normal ranges!!! God is so good!! Diva is a trooper and is tough, tough, tough. |
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 Tried and True
Posts: 21185
Location: Where I am happiest | Continued prayers for your baby. |
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Common Sense and then some
Location: So. California |  |
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Shelter Dog Lover
Posts: 10277
| RidinRank - 2016-04-29 3:00 PM Update on baby! We've decided to register her as "Eyesa Special Diva" if it's available (Eyesa Texas Hero, Special Effort bred).. We've been calling her Diva! Received terrible news yesterday while I was getting groceries.. Vet thought she could be going into kidney failure.. Kidney enzymes were elevated and protein was very, very low. We needed to get surgery done as she had started peeing through her umbilical cord yesterday morning. Unfortunately, with the bad bloodwork, we would have lost her during surgery from the anesthesia. Vet decided that there was no way that she would survive without surgery.. Went ahead with surgery under a very strong local (to numb the area) and heavy sedation. She pulled through!!!! Made it through the night and although is pretty sore today, she is perky and eating away!! Just got word, that her enzyme AND protein levels are within normal ranges!!! God is so good!! Diva is a trooper and is tough, tough, tough.
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A Somebody to Everybody
Posts: 41354
Location: Under The Big Sky Of Texas | How is the baby doing? |
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 It Goes On
Posts: 2262
Location: Muskogee, OK | Barnmom - 2016-04-26 3:47 PM
I bet she needs surgery to remove the navel. Our TB filly had to have that done last week and they ended up taking part of the bladder out too. Sounds like the infection is already up inside of her if she has a bit of a fever. What does her bloodwork look like?
Ours wasn't sick, had no fever and just a slightly elevated white count. We elected to get agressive and do the surgery to lessen the chance of a joint infection and I am glad we did, she had a pretty extensive infection.
This... Very important to be aggressive early on with these. I would recommend surgery to remove the umbilical cord and its associated structures. |
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My Heart Be Happy
Posts: 9159
Location: Arkansas | Please update us on Diva. . . |
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A Somebody to Everybody
Posts: 41354
Location: Under The Big Sky Of Texas | barrelracingchick16 - 2016-04-30 5:41 PM Barnmom - 2016-04-26 3:47 PM I bet she needs surgery to remove the navel. Our TB filly had to have that done last week and they ended up taking part of the bladder out too. Sounds like the infection is already up inside of her if she has a bit of a fever. What does her bloodwork look like?
Ours wasn't sick, had no fever and just a slightly elevated white count. We elected to get agressive and do the surgery to lessen the chance of a joint infection and I am glad we did, she had a pretty extensive infection.
This... Very important to be aggressive early on with these. I would recommend surgery to remove the umbilical cord and its associated structures.
She did have the surgery, she posted a update. |
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Regular
Posts: 95
Location: North Dakota | Hi everyone!! Ready for an update? Yay! Diva is doing awesome! We've stayed aggressive on the antibiotics. She's on ulcer medication, and a Platinum performance probiotic paste also. Her stool is getting a little loose since the surgery, BUT it's much better than what we expected. More sticky than runny. Enough about poop... The surgery went well! She was up and "broncing" in the stall 12 hours after surgery. She's definitely back to her normal self again.
We did start running into skin problems. I can only assume that it's a mixture between her kidney's failing, being dehydrated in the beginning, and the medications that she was/is on. At this point, her skin is starting to "slough" off in certain areas. The worst spot and the only spot that has broke open so far is on the outside of her right hock. The spots start out by losing the hair, then moving onto bruising/scabbing (mostly in ovals). The skin in the middle of this oval is raised and hard to the touch, like it's just lost all feeling. Wondering if there was that much nerve damage when we were dealing with the swelling from the septic arthritis? Anyway, the spot on her hock... The back portion of the oval has completely split. Before it started opening and after the swelling had went down, we were just putting DMSO mixed with Aloe onto the "dry/dead skin areas." Once it started to open, we went ahead and started wrapping the area to keep it clean as septic arthritis is still a threat. Vet recommended that baby could have had a reaction to the DMSO and to stop using it for now. Have been putting coconut oil on it instead up until this morning. Looks terrible this morning. Pretty deep, looks like possible proud flesh forming and is in the worst spot possible. Opens up wide every time baby moves in the slightest way. Need to pick up some kind of anti bacterial salve.. Any recommendations? Wanting to keep it covered so nothing reaches the joint.
Any advice has been and will be GREATLY appreciated! We've been horse owners for many, many years and have never dealt with anything like this at all!
Thanks and much love!
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Hog Tie My Mojo
Posts: 4847
Location: Opelousas, LA | I would use neosporin or SSD cream (silver sulfadiozine or something like that) both are very good antibacterials and won't cause any reactions. Prayers for your filly |
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