ERU - considering surgery?

[bserenari]

My 9 year old OTTB mare has been diagnosed with ERU and has little to no vision remaining in her right eye. We visited with the eye specialist on Saturday, and considering I do not have much experience with the disease, I’m trying to research as much as possible to try to make the best decisions to help her as much as I can.

She is currently just on aspirin daily and the eye is constantly cloudy. I was considering the implant surgery to try to keep this from progressing and limit the chances of it affecting her other eye but I want to research and get some feedback from people with experience before making a decision. Thank you all in advanced.

[Kanza]

When my horse had the implant surgery, the surgeons would not operate until the eye was calm. He was on a very aggressive medication schedule (banamine, atropine and neopolydex) leading up to the surgery in order to clear up the cloudiness and flare.

My horse had ERU in both eyes. He had the implant done in the healthier eye and my vets did not recommend having it done for the other, unhealthier eye. They felt the possible upside up of the implant was not worth the risk of retinal detachment after the surgery.

The implant did help my horse but he eventually lost his sight in the other eye and developed painful glaucoma as well. ERU really is awful. Best of luck with your horse.

[Real_Rush]

My beloved horse Rush had ERU in both eyes; first his right and then several years later the left. This was back in late '90’s, early '00’s, before the advent of the implant technology. The flare ups were controlled by drops directly onto the eyes of flurbiprofen (an NSAID) and prednisolone acetate (a SAID). As with any ERU story, his was a long and complicated one, and I eventually had to put him down due to complications he developed that I couldn’t financially “fix” at the time.

Learn as much as you can, read as much as you can, ask as many questions as you can, and do the best you can. Unfortunately ERU is a progressive disease, and even with the great success of the implant technology, there is no cure. Aggressive treatment now to halt the progression as much as possible is the best course of action. Since your mare has lost most/all of her vision in the eye, talk to your vet about having it removed. The cost incurred for the process will pale in comparison to the cost of treating the eye for an indeterminable amount of time, not to mention saving your mare from the excruciating pain of flare ups. If the idea of an empty eye socket doesn’t appeal to you, they do make implants that can make the horse look more “normal”. Good luck, and hope this helps some.

[appyrunner]

I am very sorry to hear of your situation. I had similar and sadly will be the negative “voice”. I did the implants, and laser treatment for the glaucoma at a major well-respected vet school hospital. Spent a ton of money. Still ended up with a horse that needed treatment in the eyes multiple times a day. Every day. Wore a special mask all the time and could not go out in the sun. Ongoing expensive medications. Since I work full time and am in a boarding situation, I had to pay someone to do at least part of the treatments each day. Then worry if they actually did them. Horse went blind in one eye and was losing sight in the other. Glaucoma flare ups were extremely painful and required banamine daily. Then he developed ulcers which also were costly to treat. He did not handle it well. Ultimately one of the vets counseled me that he was a danger to me and to the other people that were handling him and that his quality of life was poor. Some horses adapt to blindness well. Others are not so good. Probably if I’d have had him at home in a situation that I could control 100% of the time so he could feel more secure it would have been better. Unfortunately I did not have that option. So I put him down. Looking back I wish I had done it sooner. I was mad at the vet at the time when she said I should think of putting him down. Now in retrospect she was right and I appreciate her speaking up. Sometimes we get caught up in saving our friends at any cost. Once we start the roller coaster ride it is hard to get off. If you go down this path have an idea of how far you will go and when to say when.