Chronic colic, any vets that specialize?

[walktheline]

Some of you may have read my other couple of threads concerning the horse I recently bought who has been having consistent colic episodes every 2-3 weeks since I brought him home in July. One of them ended up being surgical, 360 degree large colon volvulus, almost lost him. Surgeon said if we had been 3-4 hours later he would not have made it.

He has continued to have episodes post surgery, 3 in 9 weeks to be exact. It’s a lot to type out all the history and all the things we’ve tried, if anyone is so inclined they could read the other threads for some more background, but my question is, has anyone on here dealt with chronic colic before, would be interested to hear if you found a solution, but also if there was a particular vet or internist that helped? Or any vets that are highly regarded/specialize in colic/GI issues? Would be interested in sending a detailed history, paying a consult fee for their thoughts. I’m consulting with my vet of course who is great, but looking to crowdsource at this point because nothing is working and I don’t see how he survives another year if he continues this way.

[NaturallyHappy]

I can’t remember all the details from your other threads. My neighbor has a horse w IBD, discovered on exploratory surgery for colic. She eats Triple Crown Senior Active. The starch is more digestible due to the extruding process. She also gets beet pulp, alfalfa cubes and free choice grass hay. She went to a minor university teaching hospital.

[walktheline]

Yes we have been reducing sugar and starch in his diet by essentially treating him like a metabolic horse, thinking it may be a hindgut acidosis issue. Soaking his hay and putting him in a paddock with very little grass. We’d been doing that for about 3 weeks and he still had another pretty painful episode over the weekend.

He has been on a senior feed that is 13% NSC. Our next step is to cut that out entirely and try forage only diet, though I really don’t understand why 1 qt of a senior feed 2x daily would be causing him so many problems. As many of the vets say it is one of the safest things you can feed being forage based, and is the go to for colic recovery. But trying to go by what the horse is telling me rather than what the books or feed tags say because all of his episodes have closely followed either AM or PM feed.

[Hoofbeat_Heartbeat]

My horse had/has chronic colic; 14 episodes in 5 years, 4 of which resulted in clinic trips for fluids. He was diagnosed with IBD and has been on an only pellet diet, fed with 1-2 gallons of water per feed (4 feeds per day), and he hasn’t had an episode in over a year knock on all the wood.

He gets a full treatment of Abler’s “Ulcerguard” (30 days), approximately every 6 months.

He was also recently diagnosed with Cushings so we have started Prascend.

He is my absolute dream horse, and is a once-in-a-lifetime kind of guy, which is why we have gone through all these trials to figure out what hopefully works for him.

Feel free to DM me for more info. It’s been a journey. Sending big jingles your way; it is NOT easy to have one of these ones

[walktheline]

Thank you for sharing. Very happy that you’ve found a routine that works for him. Much of the information surrounding hindgut issues seems to be targeted towards horses like yours— the IBD/colitis/FWS/chronic diarrhea types, and I think that’s what’s making this such a tricky frustrating case— my horse doesn’t present like that. His manure is always good and normal. I know removing all long stem forage and going to purely chopped/pelleted forage for those types is often advised, the surgeon suggested it for my guy, but my home vet actually told me to try other avenues first for just that reason, that he doesn’t really present as a leaky gut, chronic diarrhea, colitis type. Also trying to avoid omeprazole altogether since we suspect it is a hindgut issue and he probably has some dysbiosis going on, so we don’t want to make that worse. He also scoped clean and healthy, so no need for it really.

[Hoofbeat_Heartbeat]

Thank you!

Funnily enough, he never had chronic diarrhea, or really any other symptoms of IBD, besides chronic colic. I’m not sure if he is a true IBD case, or just loosely falls into the category. He was diagnosed after he had an abdominal tap, and the vets found elevated protein levels, hence the IBD diagnoses. They told me at the time that to treat this/his chronic colic, he would need to go on an all grass pasture diet or pellets. Pellets are what made the most sense so here we are.

I really hope you find something that works for your guy!!

[GraceLikeRain]

I don’t have a specific vet to recommend. My instinct would be to identify 5-10 teaching hospitals in your region and call asking for their recommendation. They’ll likely recommend their own internist but I’d also ask “if I can’t make it to you, who else do you recommend” and see if any names start floating to the top.

Having read your other thread I have so much empathy. I wish you were just diet change or small modifications but it does sound like you really need someone who is the best of the best.

[NaturallyHappy]

@walktheline, the TripleCrown Senior Active is very different than other Senior feeds. It might be worth calling them to ask in more detail than I shared. I feed it soaked and have added soaked cubes to it. The number is 800.451.9916. Stacy is the nutritionist. She’s been terrific for me. I hope this helps you.

[IPEsq]

What type of colic? Does he keep displacing? Or something else?

[BigPaintHorse]

I know it seems totally counter to everything we have ever been taught but we had a school pony who could not eat hay. Alfalfa Pellets, timothy pellets ok. Real actual hay… colic, even cubes, colic.

School pony so we never figured out why because diagnostics were to expensive but he was high teens when I left the barn so it was working… just weird.

Bry

[stargzng386]

If you’re open to a more wholistic approach I highly recommend Martha. I have a pony that kept colicing. She helped me target and reset the entire gut from a nutritionist perspective and knock on wood no issues at all since. She does all forms of consultations and has information on her website.

Home - Four Oaks Equine Nutrition

[grzywinskia]

Where are you located? I can likely give you a recommendation of someone reasonably locally? You’re definitely looking at an Internal Medicine Specialist. The two best ones in the country (IMO) are Nathan Slovis at Hagyard and Laszlo Hunyadi (lives in Hawaii- would consult). I can share their contacts if you’re interested

[grzywinskia]

PS- I had a chronic colic horse- ultimately it was repro related and seems to be sorted praise the lord

[walktheline]

The surgical colic was a 360 degree large colon volvulus. He had so much gas build up/distention by the time we got to the clinic that the doctor couldn’t get her arm all the way in to do a rectal. The last few episodes I believe we have caught early so either was before the gas built up enough to displace him, or that the displacement was still in mild enough stages that it resolved treating medically at home.

[ClaireBear_NZ]

Interesting you say you had a colicker that also had Cushings. I had a horse who began chronic gas colics at about 17 through to 21 or so when he was diagnosed with Cushings. Predictable colics, i.e. he got out onto lots of grass, stuffed himself with rich hay etc. Once he started on Prascend, the mild gas colics stopped entirely. He was eventually put down due to a sudden severe colic but that was when he was 29.5 with failing teeth etc etc but in the 8 years between diagnosis and death, he didn’t colic once even on a considerably less restricted diet.

[IPEsq]

I asked because I lost a horse to a 360 degree volvulus of the large colon. The surgeon said that it was far too easy to pull his colon out of his body, and the reason he twisted was because there was an abnormality of the attachment of the colon to the abdominal wall. It was too late by the time he went to surgery, but if he had been able to be saved, there was a procedure they’d do to tighten that area, which she said was often successful. I’d consider the colic surgeon who attended to my horse to be an expert on the gut/colic:

https://vetmedbiosci.colostate.edu/directory/member/?id=diana-hassel-1022

[walktheline]

So sorry for your loss. It is truly terrifying how rapidly fatal that type of colic can be. The surgeon who worked on my horse said there were no anatomic abnormalities to explain the chronic colic. Are you referring to colopexy? I have looked into it, but hoping we could find a different solution because from what I understand it doesn’t come without risk and the horse’s performance career is very limited after

[amottb17]

Did he colic with his prior owner? What is your boarding situation like? My anecdote:

My TB mare colicked the day I bought her in 2021 as a 4yo and proceeded to colic more than 20 times over the course of the next year and a half - including 3 hospitalizations, often happening bi-weekly, etc. Gas, impaction, spasmodic, you name it, she’s had it. Many displacements. Luckily no surgery, but since I was at the barn all day every day I caught every single one quickly and had the vet on the way.

We did ALL the tests with no resolution and after her 2nd and 3rd hospital visits the local hospital urged me to put her on the pellet-only diet, but I ultimately decided not to move forward with it due to her high anxiety/stress mentality, ulcer history, boarding restrictions, the fact that she is an extremely hard keeper, and my desire to try to try to get her into a situation with turnout. Though I pocketed it as something to consider in the future.

I instead did the opposite - working with my primary vet I moved her to 24/7 all-you-can-eat hay access, tested the hay to make sure it was high quality, and also added Assure Guard Gold to her diet while pulling her completely off of all grain (she cannot even have a handful of a ration balancer, she is that sensitive). I instead moved her to soaked beet pulp 2x/day with minimal supplements. That made a HUGE difference initially, drastically reducing her colic frequency and severity and then a few months later I finally moved her to a quieter barn that could continue the 24/7 hay access while also giving her 8-10 hours a day of grass turnout in a 10 acre field with friends (prior barn she was lucky to get 45 mins/day on small dry lot with one other horse). This made the biggest difference for her, mentally/emotionally as well as physically. She now * knock on wood * only colics approx 1x/year very mild, and after employing the expertise of a nutritionist to advise on the forage-only diet she has put SO much weight on that people don’t believe me when I say she doesn’t get grain. She is now 7yo, in full work and jumping 1.0-1.05m.

I’m not sure what your barn and feeding situation is like, but if possible I would highly recommend trying a quieter living situation with constant hay access/ample turnout and moving forage-only. Even if only temporarily to see if it makes a difference. I loved the barn we were at and it was very hard for me to leave - but personally, I prefer to try the simplest route first before diving into different tests/medicinal routes or exploratory surgery which was next on our list. I’ve found that often the hospitals like to try to hyper-focus on little things rather than look at the big picture first

[starsandsun]

I will jump in only to suggest that you search within the forum for my very long post about this. By way of quick background, my horse coliced persistently for nearly a year. No other vet or vet hospital was able to get it figured out and I spent a fortune. My internal specialist did.

You’re going to get a hundred different ideas, but believe me when I say that I tried ALL of them and nothing worked except getting a real diagnosis from a specialist and a treatment plan.

[walktheline]

Thank you for all of this input. Previous owners swear never an issue with colic. Several of the vets/professionals I’ve spoken to don’t believe that, but I guess that’s neither here nor there at this point.

He has been off grain for 3 days now, getting a Timothy/alfalfa pellet mix soaked 3x day. No colic in the last 3 days but his gut sounds have been insane, like can hear them across the stall crazy, visually rattling his flank. He actually has been on Assure Guard Gold as well since surgery. Added Equishure and a yeast probiotic too, at the suggestion of my home vet.

I do board him and the barn management has been great about getting him what he needs. He already gets free choice soaked hay. Typically turn out is from 7:30-2:00, but unfortunately he has gotten into the habit of running and wanting to come in around 12:00-1:00 or so. Not sure if it’s because there is less grass and he is just bored. We do have a hay net out there for him.