COPD/Heaves

[Desatoya_Oaks]

I have a mare that’s been struggling with COPD since 2021. She is best managed when she is turned out 24/7 with access to high quality forage.

She was moved to a new property 2 weeks ago. The biggest change is that she now has free access to a stall with shavings and we are closer to the coast, so the humidity may be slightly higher.

She started having a reaction this weekend. We’ve put her in a paddock that only has a run in with no shavings. She is being treated for this attack with steroids and Zyrtec, but otherwise she has been managed without meds or supplements for 2 years with only an occasional flare up.

I’ll be having a consultation with my vet this week to discuss our options for management moving forward. Whether that’s keeping her out of the barn entirely, or if we incorporate other management practices.

I’ve ordered a Flexineb e3, but on the brief phone call with the emergency vet today, I was advised that those may not be the most effective for chronic cases.

I would obviously still treat with steroids when she’s reacting, but my thought is to include daily or every other day treatment with the nebulizer.

Has anyone had success or noticeable improvement with a nebulizer for their COPD ponies? Do you think it was worth the expense, or would you/have you opted for other alternatives?

[cayuse]

I have used a steriod inhaler (the kind humans use) via an Aerohippus chamber on my pony and it worked really well. There is a cup on the chamber that goes over one nostril and they inhale the med that way. Takes only a couple of minutes to administer. At first I thought he might be wary of having something over his nostril, but he was fine as it’s just placed there lightly.

[LCDR]

This is the time of the year when grass pollen is still fairly high. It also is into the onset of ragweed pollen season. So the move happened at a really high allergic reaction-inducing time. Hang in there; cooler weather and lower pollen counts and lower humidity will be here fairly soon.

[SusanO]

I don’t know where you are located but in the Southeast some horses are affected by SPA-RAO (summer pasture associated recurrent airway obstruction (i.e. pasture heaves). I had a pony affected by this and I thought he was going to die the second summer I had him because he was struggling so hard to breathe. I did not own the property, so I moved him to another area, and he was fine within a few weeks. The bad area had 5 horses in it and 3 of those had pasture heaves in the summer. The new place had him in a stall for 12 hours a day but he was able to go on pasture there the rest of the time and not be affected. Just a change of environment was a huge factor. So it may or may not be because of the shavings. The higher humidity could be a factor too.

I have another pony that is looking like he may also be affected. He is at my house - not the other location. I have not really noticed it before but we have had an extremely wet, humid summer and the grass got tall. Currently he wants to be in his stall under a fan and not out on grass. I never had much success with oral albuterol, clenbuterol or any of the cough remedies. However, I did not try a nebulizer. The only thing that worked was a new environment. I am praying for an early Fall and an early frost which seems to help.

[RedHorses]

Mine is and has been on daily, oral Prednisolone and Hydroxyzine in season for seasonal allergy induced heaves. He goes off it in the winter. I do have Clenbuteral as an emergency boost on really bad days.

I got a Bemer in the spring of 2022 and with regular use was able to reduce his Prednisolone dose, and eliminate Clenbuteral. I have non-subjective data proving the benefit of the Bemer use on my one horse (though I did talk to a couple of other users who had heaves afflicted horses before buying my own) in the form of recorded breath rate and lung sounds from several years before starting the Bemer use, as well as after. The Bemer has no immediate affect on the horse’s breathing. It works over time with regular use by triggering the horse’s parasympathetic nervous system, which is the rest and recovery state, as well as opening up the micro capillaries. That’s why I wanted to try it - lungs have a huge number of tiny blood vessels.

Unfortunately we are having an extremely hot (for here) with high humidity summer, and we have been affected by forest fire smoke several times this year. I have had to increase his Prednisolone, and have used Clenbuteral a few times. That said, I don’t think he would have made it through the 2023 forest fire smoke events without the regular Bemer use over the preceeding year. For the most part his bad days this year have been no worse than his best in season, pre-Bemer days in 2021. I have become less willing to let his breathing ride the razor edge of barely managing, and alter his drug doses as needed.

My horse does have PPID (well controlled with Prascend) which puts him at higher risk of laminitis, and in the ‘limit steroid use’ category. Back when I started him on Pred there was a study done attempting to induce laminitis with Prednisolone - it failed so I was willing to accept the risk. I don’t know if any more recent research has changed the odds.

Vets did offer puffer meds several times, but I was boarding where the non-horsey spouse administered meds semi frequently, and wanted the easiest possible, guaranteed administered option. Oral syringes were best with my horse.

[Djones]

I manage my guy with 2 dex tablets (4mg) and 10 cc albuterol syrup orally every day. The flexineb i bought is helpful, but daily maintenance is more impactful and easy with what I noted above. He lives outside in Alabama.