I’m writing for a friend of mine.She has been dealing with “something”
like scratches on her horse for well over 6 months now.I first saw it last September, but she
thought it was just a reaction from wearing interference boots.The horse has pretty furry legs (even
though arab) so she didn’t really pay more
attention at the time since it wasn’t obvious.
The horse has had a couple surgeries – one to cut the check
ligament for a club foot, and the other to cut the cunean
tendons for arthritis.That was
done over the winter so the horse was kept in a stall for a while.It was immediately after the check
ligament procedure that he came up lame and sore in the hocks and then had the cuneans cut. Right after that, like the first day the
horse was allowed out on pasture, something really weird happened – it appeared
he sprained his rear pasterns.
You could hear a clicking noise and actually see the
pasterns moving between P1 and P2. It was really strange.He was soft casted
and when the casts came off, the “scratches”
were really a mess.One vet has a
theory that since the “scratches” or whatever was there all along,
it inflamed internal tissues, weakening things, allowing the pastern issues.
This was months and months ago and the horse has primarily
been on stall rest with the pastern problem and all the while treating what
appeared to be scratches. But it
really doesn’t seem like normal scratches because it’s come up
almost to the hocks, well beyond the white area.The owner has been cleaning and treating
the scabs but it quickly scabs back over and there is a yellowish gunk over
very pink skin.
The vet no longer believes it is scratches and is doing
blood work now.I’ve heard
people saying that there have been lots of weird cases of scratches this year,
but nothing like this.Someone
suggested that the horse be tested for lupus.I tried to do some research on lupus in
horses for her, but didn’t come up with much.
Does anyone have any ideas?She’s spent an awful lot of money
on all this – the vet has been out almost every week since January and he’s
trying to be judicious with the tests to avoid slamming her with more huge
bills.And she’s also very
frustrated as she’d hoped to be beginning to compete in endurance this
year – and the horse isn’t thrilled either!Last year she did her first ride and
really fell in love with the sport. Thanks for any suggestions!
