I'm sure some of you remember seeing my previous posts. After 2 years struggling, injections, surgery, epm treatments etc with zero changes and nothing to show for it I got a second opinion. Thank goodness I did. Not saying anything will change but I did get some NEW answers and information and not the same old same old. Turns out my horse has KS. Not to a surgical point, and is considered to be manageable so I'm guessing we will be injecting it when we address it I'm a couple weeks. For now we are working on topline after si injections before we address the KS. 

After a trail ride this weekend it seemed like he was pretty back sore. I feel like his saddle is riding up hill and putting pressure on his back. Until we can get him built up and stronger in the topine, any recommendations for saddle pads or bridge pads? 

Also curious as to what others symptoms were before finding out their horse had KS? Mine particularly stopped turning 1st barrel in a run. He might work great at a slow lope but when we go to run he wouldn't turn at all. 

This is my suggestion on topline help. I have a horse that has to have EPM treatments pretty regularly. ( I have a huge possum population). After a lot of research, I decided to go with TRI AMINO. I fed as directed and was very pleased with results. I have been feeding it for about 6 years now. My farrier commented on how much better that horse's feet looked so I started feeding it to the horse with funky feet. That definitely helped. I have three on TRI AMINO now for three different things-one topline, one feet, and one had her tail chewed on a little so growing it out. If I hadn't seen results I would not still be using it. I order from Valley Vet. 

You'll have better luck building the topline if you inject the back at the beginning, a horse with a sore back isn't going to want to properly engage. I've been around the circle many times with mine for 3 years. I had to inject every 4ish months, so I finally just did surgery since it was way cheaper than injecting. You typically will have to inject the SI regulary as well with the back. It was running me about $3k a year to inject, surgery was $1,400 and 6 weeks off. Hasn't cost me any more money since & its been 2.5 years. I built my mare up with MVP Amino15x while rehabing from the surgery and have kept her on it. I like adding aminos when building topline. As far as symptoms, my mare just refused to lope to the right at all. She'd stop short & refuse to move or start backing up, but going left was fine. She felt a little stiff at the trot to the right at times, but would still go forward. She rides fine now. Double J made me a custom tree for her at no additional cost and I use an SK spinal relief pad 

I had a horse that had kissing spines. My vet said he was not a candidate for surgery so I had him injected regularly. I don't remember how much it cost to inject but was reasonable. I rode the horse for six years with injections. Finally retired him because of chips in his knee. I friend posted an X-ray of her horse a year after KS surgery and it looked much worse than before the surgery. All that had grown back and was worse. Dr Honnas is probably the best at kissing spine surgery. He told me that it was not uncommon for the spines to grow spinous material back around the spine

Yes, that happens a lot with the bone shave. A lot of surgeries fail as well due to lack of maintence afterwards, you have to keep them in strong core work permanetly or you're wasting your time and $. A lot of people just do surgery & act like they're fixed and let them ride hollow and not with their backs constantly strong and lifted. Its a chore to maintain them surgery or not. I just had the lig snip done on mine while she was standing sedated. Injections will depend on horse, many do well with annual and some are like mone and its very short term. And the more often you inject, the less it'll work in the future. It just depends on what your bank account would prefer, some like to just keep injecting for years and years. I chose to quit spending money I didn't have to