Bladder Incontinence in a Gelding

[leighbo009]

Anyone have any experience with bladder incontinence?

I have a 14yo OTTB gelding. I have owned him since his track days, since he was 5. So I have owned him for 9 years now. 2 years ago he started dribbling urine and never peeing. We have been to 2 different vet schools about it, and still don’t have great answers. It started pretty suddenly, maybe a couple months or less after we moved 4 hours to my new job. No other changes in him other than the incontinence. We did find ulcers in the bladder, which we where able to take care of with misoprosal. We tried him on bethanicol, but it caused him to go off feed each time we tried it, so it’s hard to tell if it helped since as soon as he went off feed he started dropping weight and we stopped it to get him eating again.

One school thought it was an autoimmune disorder and the other thinks its neuro, but only effecting the bladder. Looking for anything else we may be able to try?

Also, anyone have any experience showing a horse with an issue like this? I have done some local shows with him, and it hasn’t caused issues. Also we have done clinics and we just end up explaining the issue to multiple people at both shows and clinics. We event, and I worry that an official will tell me he isn’t “sound” to compete. Any information on if this could happen? I have all the paperwork explaining the findings, but the answers aren’t really there. He schools well and jumps well, so just trying to figure out if it will be a waste of money to attempt a recognized show again.

[Applecore]

It sounds like you have done a lot to investigate this already! I’m a very western-trained health care person generally, but I have seen the occasional remarkable result with acupuncture, especially for the urinary system and other areas with lots of nerve innervation. I would consider getting the best veterinarian who does acupuncture in your area to give it a try and see if it helps. Acupuncture is very safe and hopefully not too expensive to try. You could also consider chiropractic as a ‘hail mary’ as well - again I would use a veterinarian who is certified in chiropractic. I would recommend veterinarian providers for chiro/acupuncture as this is a complicated case that involves internal organs and needs a pretty deep knowledge of physiology.

Did the vet who thought it was autoimmune try a course of steroids? You could also ask your veterinarians about whether something like Proin would be an option in your horse’s case. It’s labeled for dogs so any use in horses would be off label (ie a risk), and whether it would have the potential to be effective depends on your horse’s condition and diagnostic results. It also would be illegal to show on.

[dotneko]

My guy developed bladder incontinence after a bout of EPM. That was really the only neuro deficit. He required extra cleaning and would get a scald on his hind legs if not kept up with. He could still drop to urinate, but would like in between. He was 25 at the time and lived to 30.

[initiate1987]

We had a horse in my barn who dribbled constantly. He was also one of our best eq horses, so he still went to rated shows. He never had a problem with officials, especially not saying he was unsound. We just had to make sure it all stayed cleaned up on his legs.

[Goforward]

Lyme disease?