I have a 9 year old horse that popped a splint before I got
her a couple years ago. Earlier
this spring I thought she might have stressed a tendon as I knew she took a
funny step and there was some slight swelling.When I took her to the vet, he found something
else – that she was sensitive to the bump from the splint.He blocked at the splint and she was
sound.We took extra precautions
and treated her as if she had still stressed a tendon and decided to get back
to the splint later.So now that I’m
checking her to see how she’s moving, she’s been off on both the
left and right, but mostly the left which is the leg with the splint.
So I took her to a different vet with more lab tools and we
came to the same conclusion that it was the splint – and she’s
probably stressing the other leg to protect the first.We x-rayed the splint and the vet (a
very well known lameness expert) and she said she’d never seen anything
like this.
Her splint bone has fractured along the length and is
definitely irritating the suspensory ligament, as
well as the cannon bone which is laying down some extra calcification.
So the 2 options she had were the Shock Wave and
surgery.I’ve had Shock Wave
done with great success on the kissing spines of another horse, but I just can’t
imagine in my head how it could help this situation. Even the vet said it might not work long
term and we wouldn’t know for 6-8 months later.The Shock Wave is 1/3 the cost of
surgery (which she recommends be done with the horse on the table, not standing,
hence the cost).
Surgery is $1300+ which is a lot for us right now.But I really don’t want to spend
$4-500 on something that isn’t as likely to work and then find out right
before ride season next year that it didn’t work and still have to do the
surgery which has a 6 week recovery.
Any comments on the use of the Shock
Wave in this situation?Or has anyone had success or problems
with a splint removal on a standing horse?I know I’m leaning toward the safest (expensive) surgery, but my
husband does want to make sure we’ve checked out the other options
thoroughly enough that we are not senselessly wasting money.
