Anyone deal with a horse with a failed tieback? Not sure if I should consider a second attempt at surgery as the surgeon is concerned that he will not be able to make it much better due to scar tissue. Horse is definitely struggling at collected work though.
I’ve known of four (!) w failed surgery. If there is a way to get a second opinion, it might be worth a try. None of these owners did a second surgery, but these horses were mostly trail ridden and the owners liked that they were quiet. I do know of one upper level horse who had tie back surgery as he struggled w collection. He did very well after surgery, but it may have been his first one. I also know of a standardbred race horse who is racing well after a second surgery when the initial surgery failed. I hope this is helpful somehow.
Thanks! Sounds like it does fail quite a bit. Mine would be fine if he was the quiet trail horse type but he jumps at rocks and trees and wayward weeds so not a very relaxing way to ride him. I think the fact that he knows he can’t breathe well makes him more jumpy.
I’m not sure if it actually fails a lot…those horses just may be the ones we hear about. Two were from TB adoption agencies. I hope you can figure something out…
We had a failed tie back. I wrote about it in another thread and here is a copy:
We had roaring surgery done on our then 14 year old eventing gelding last summer. He had the same heavy breathing symptoms that became much worse progressively. He moved up to Training in May and he couldn’t make time, but he got around, but we knew he couldn’t compete anymore like that.
He ended up having 2 surgeries because after the first one (under standard sedation), the tie back (laryngoplasty) failed due to atrophy of the tissue in the cartilage and the sutures failed by the next day, likely due to his age. He also had a left sided ventriculocordectomy (not laser) at the same time.
A few days later, they did a left sided partial arytenoidectomy and right sided ventriculocordectomy under standing sedation with an endoscope through the same hole in his neck.
He came home the next day and we had to squirt throat spray in a good sized hole in his neck until it healed, and when he drank water it came out of the hole. It was pretty gross. But the hole healed in about a month and he was a very good patient.
His came home on June 8th, he started trotting under saddle by end of August, and he competed Novice at end of September and came in 1st place! He moved back up to Training at end of October and his galloping on XC was awesome and he looked so much happier doing his job. He would have made time if he had not had a refusal.
He can’t really whinny anymore, but he makes a scratchy sound, but I think now a year later, we can actually hear a little bit of a whinny. It was very strange hearing him go so quietly under saddle without the roaring at first. We can still hear him breathing, but nothing like before surgery.
One thing I didn’t know before surgery was that the surgeon expected to find some sort of tissue or scar growth at his post-op visit, but he didn’t have any and the vet was surprised. I guess he would have had to have another procedure to fix that. So we got very lucky and had no complications in the healing process. Maybe having laser surgery is different, I am not sure.
We are happy we did it since it all worked out, but I have read there can be many complications. We had our ups and downs during healing when we thought maybe we shouldn’t have done it. The horse didn’t seem to be bothered by it, though. He ate just fine. I think we had to be really careful about him always eating from the ground so they don’t inhale any food. He’s not had any issues since he healed.
Update: He had a great 2020 eventing season and moved up to Prelim. He may not ever make time, but his breathing is great and he is getting faster at galloping on XC. He’s in the best shape he has ever been in. (And he is a draft cross!)
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I was told it fails alot in older horses
Thanks for sharing this! Mine had the original tieback in 2012 (he was 7) and I am pretty sure it failed almost immediately. Did you notice a lack of stamina where he was breathing harder/long recovery after exercise or was it more the noise and not able to gallop as fast? Would you mind sharing where the surgery was done?
He had an obvious roar sound while exercising that got a lot louder in 2019. We never noticed any long recovery after exercise issues, but we may not have noticed. He was always ridden on the flat 5-6 days/week. He’s an eventer and after a successful 2018 season at Novice level, had moved up to do his first Training level in May 2019 and it was obvious watching him on course that he was a lot noisier than the year before and he didn’t have the stamina. We knew we could not ask him to perform at that level again. We took him to University of IL and he was tested and I believe he was only at about 50% of breathing capacity, so he was a pretty severe roarer. He is very talented, so decided to take the chance on the surgery, because the roaring for him was a career ender. He had the surgery at U of I; there is a fantastic vet there that has done a lot of these surgeries, and he would not give up until he fixed him.
It was obvious the first time he ran XC again that the surgery had been a huge success. And he has only improved in stamina and performance since then. He is in a good conditioning program starting in spring through fall and they do long gallop sets, so he is getting more competitive as far as making time on XC. He is a horse that loves to compete, so he gives his all (even before surgery when he couldn’t breathe, the poor guy!).
If you click on my name you should be able to find that older thread, I think there is more good info on there from others.
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Had one on a mare I owned. Waited.about 8 weeks, redid it, she went on to be just fine, and kicked butt in the jumpers once she co
uld breathe!
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Thanks! Do you think it matters if it is a long time between surgeries? Mine was done about 8 years ago.
I wouldn’t think that was horribly problematic.
In the case of my mare, Ella, the resident did the surgery.
They looked in w/ a scope at the end of sx, and things looked ok.
The next day she was scoped and it had failed.
Hea of LA sx at the time had been one of my teachers, and felt badly that it had failed, but was also interested in why, if possible, and he had a little teaching money left over, so he said it I wanted to do it before the end of the year, he’d pick up part of the cost.
I said if I could scrub in and watch, sure.
I got to hold the retractors.
She developed a sterile abscess at the skin suture line a few weeks after the 2nd sx, but it opened and drained while I was probing it, and after that, she healed up fine.
Lost her in a barn fire awhile ago–she was in foal to my Arab stallion for a half-Arab jumper for her co-owner.
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Gosh, I’m SO sorry you lost her. That’s horrible.
I wish there was a study that followed horses 10+ yrs that have had tie-back surgery. This is a common surgery and you would think more studies would be out there, especially in the racing industry.
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