Groin muscle tear (horse)?

[Critter]

I will start out by saying that I am over and done with 2021…but it’s clearly not done with me. I lost my 5yo in February to EDM (progressive neuro degeneration that came on pretty suddenly). Now, it looks like my older (16yo) guy has torn his gracilis (groin) muscle.

Not finding a lot of info…so anyone have experiences with this? He’s been not quite right behind…and I had actually scheduled a lameness eval at the university vet, but they are booked 3 weeks out. But he has a hx of chronic SI issues, which can make him a bit back and hock sore…usually we can manage and he can work PSG/I1 level comfortably.

Thursday he and the 3 yo were playing over the fence and I came out to a broken board. Older guy came in slow and then was acting colicky. When I went to banamine he felt hot…yup, temp almost 104. Call to vet. With the banamine on board, temp came down, he seemed back to normal. Spiked again the last two days…vets had drawn blood thinking anaplasmosis. Banamine was doing fine keeping his temp under control. No horses in/out of the barn and no other symptoms, so viral stuff not likely.

Blood came back high neutrophils…so vets decide not anaplasmosis. Comes out to give him a shot of Exceed abx…and shortly before they come he has swelled up in the groin area…a lot! Vet is glad we now have an answer…fever and neutrophils with the swelling where it is match a muscle tear reaction. The abx should cover us with any start of cellulitis.

He is on bute, banamine for a few days…ulcergard already on board. Going to let him go out and graze for a few hours (but on a different field as I don’t want him playing with the 3yo)…he’s pretty sane, so I know he won’t be out running if the temptation of playing is gone. Plus, I think some gentle movement is better than him being on a stall rest. He’s got sticky stifles, so staying in will only make him worse. Already cold hosing a few times a day.

I worried this might be a total end for his riding…given his history of SI and back stuff, I always had to be really careful. We are going to do an ultrasound later this week to see if we can assess how much of a tear. Anyone have any experiences with bringing a horse back from a groin ms tear? Timeline? Other treatment options?

[bingbingbing]

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[JB]

@Critter

He is on bute, banamine for a few days

BOTH? What reason did your vet give?

without knowing the actual damage, it’s going to be had to know the rehab time. But horses do return from muscle tears all the time. The When and How depends on what muscle and how badly

I would be contacting places like New Bolton, etc for a consult once the u/s is done. Find out their recommendations for treatment and a rehab plan.

[Critter]

Both for 3 days…the bute is more for the fever/cellulitis while the banamine to deal more with the soft tissue pain. The banamine dose is only a half a dose twice a day, so a low amount. She’s a very experienced vet, so I trust her judgement.

He was scheduled for a eval a NBC before this happened…I am wondering if what I was feeling while riding was the start of a strain. I already updated the sports med specialist I use at NBC (who knows my gelding well)…so I will follow whatever she suggests as well. Was just hoping to hear others experiences so I know what to prepare for.

[IPEsq]

Well mine just seems to have torn a pec muscle all by himself so I’m hoping muscle tears heal easily. There was a massive hematoma, which is now only about the size of a baseball. Still not great for ultrasound, and we are waiting to see what the radiologist says. No fever or other signs of injection but he now has persistent pitting edema along the lower/rear part of the belly. Hematoma/injury is just before/at the girth area. All the edema is now behind the girth area. I’ll let you know if I learn anything interesting about muscles!

[Meshach1]

So my horse also came in last week hardly able to walk, and a hard painful lump developed on his inner thigh – high up across from the base of his sheath. By the time the vet arrived, he had a 104 temp. I hadn’t even noticed the lump until I was standing behind him talking to her. She assumed it was a bad reaction to an insect bite (he is very sensitive and has had reactions before), gave him IV doxytetracycline, banamine and tubed with electrolyte water. The next day the lump tripled in size and more diffuse. Temperature was normal after that. A week later, the lump is still there and the right butt cheek is more swollen than left but it doesn’t seem painful anymore.

Now I suspect that it was a groin injury. It didn’t occur to me till I read this post that a fever could accompany it. Where was the swelling on your horse?

[Critter]

So mine ended up with no groin tear…instead it was a blood clot! So bizarre! He came in with the fever and the swelling came 2-3 days later. It was the inside of his right groin, way up high (about even with the sheath, but on the leg). After the initial swelling, he had several days of being completely cripple lame and the swelling spread to the entire leg.

We did an ultrasound about 3 weeks after the initial fever/swelling…and our vet thought she saw a clot (according to the university vets - very unusual for a field vet to catch it on imaging and recognize it with the portable machines). So off to the main clinic we went…6 inch long clot in the saphenous vein. There was blood flow around it. So a 2 week course of Plavix. We just went this week for a follow up (this is 10 weeks after)…and the clot is almost fully resolved. They can still see thickening of the wall where it was, and some webbing of the collateral veins…but no big clot.

They still can’t really say why it happened…but you may want to rule a blot clot out…as apparently the high fever is more likely to indicate a clot than a muscle tear.

[Meshach1]

a blood clot! good grief! these horses would last five minutes out in the wild. that is very interesting. that sounds like the same spot as my guy. When I brought him in the AM he was walking very slowly and looked like he had the worst neurological disease ever then about 3 hours later is when I saw the lump and got the fever. Thank you for the update!

[Critter]

Here was the early swelling. Mine came in slow and colicky…when I went to banamine him I noticed he was really hot…like 104.7! Fingers crossed your guy bounces back okay. It was a scary few days (I almost took him to the university clinic because he was so very lame and not improving). He just had to keep things interesting.