Aww I’m sorry! We suspected that with mine too but we did an ACTH baseline in the fall that came back normal and then did an oral sugar test more recently which also came back normal so thankfully mine is not PPID or IR.
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I’m on 18 months of rehab for a hind suspensory branch injury. I did the stall rest thing for almost a year and it did not improve so I let Dr. Green take a stab at it and after 6 months, according to my vet, the branch is healed! Little did I know this is just the beginning of my next journey of rehab. Currently I’m up to 10 minutes of trotting with the goal to get to 30 in a month. Then maybe canter? And then? At this point the vets are hopeful he’ll return to low level eventing by 2025? But no guarantees. I was told that hind suspensory injuries have a poor prognosis so I’m cautiously optimistic. I wish you the best with your horse and be ready to throw a lot of time at this injury.
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Wanted to give everyone an update: The suspensory shoes we tried on her hinds made her LESS comfortable for whatever reason, so we just pulled those off this week. Her pain level was still pretty high on 2g Bute a day, so we went up to 4g one day just to see how she would react and it didn’t help. My vet suggested we try Banamine instead as it apparently tends to help more with soft tissue pain. So we switched her to 8cc Banamine twice a day…it’s only been 1 day but she does seem a LOT more comfortable already. Hopefully that continues!
I had a podiatrist come out and he agreed with my vet regarding switching to Banamine. Because of her pain level we took rads again of her hinds just to make sure there was nothing that would suggest Laminitis. He said the lamina are slightly inflamed but there’s been no movement of the coffin bone so she is not foundering thankfully. We tried slipping some wedges on for her to see if she liked them, but it didn’t seem to help her comfort AND it definitely dropped her fetlocks (which puts more strain on her suspensories) which is NOT what we want so we decided wedges are definitely not a good idea for her (we suspected they wouldn’t be but figured might as well see). He mentioned clogs, which I guess conform to the horse’s hooves after a few days and the horse is able to adjust the way they stand in them to fit how they need. So that is something we could try. For now we are leaving her barefoot though…AND I was SO thankful that this vet thought biologics would be something we could try! I had been wanting PRP but the vet who did her MRI said it wouldn’t work because there is no lesion to inject into. The podiatrist did Alpha 2 (A2M), which is a biologic that is heavier on its anti-inflammatory effects than healing properties (vs. PRP which does more healing than anti-inflammatory). He did multiple injections into all 4 of her suspensory branch areas. There’s a chance it won’t do anything, but it certainly won’t hurt, and I am willing to try whatever I can at this point to help her!
So far, a couple vets have told me that she could be in the early stages of DSLD but of course there’s no way to know for sure, and she doesn’t really fit the profile 100% - apparently typically the onset of DSLD is usually earlier in life, in their teen years – my mare is 23. Also, her fetlocks aren’t very dropped AND they look the exact same as they did when I got her at age 7 and she’s been sound her entire life up til this lameness! We have a theory that the fiber footing at the barn I was at when this lameness began may have been what pushed her over the edge in this case. Thankfully I have moved barns and the one I’m at now has sand footing - and I’ve been handwalking her in the grass anyway. So we aren’t sure what exactly this is yet…in the meantime, I am going to treat this like it’s a suspensory injury and do everything I can to rehab it and help it heal. If it is DSLD, rehab is certainly not going to hurt it. But if it’s NOT DSLD and I don’t do anything right now to rehab her, I’ll have no chance of potentially getting her back as even a walking trail horse someday.
So we are up to 25 mins of handwalking a day now, slowly increasing that in 5 min increments every 2 weeks (I reached out to Dr. Carol Gillis herself and she designed a rehab program for me!) And she remains on overnight turnout in a small paddock, since she’s never been one to bother with running around in turnout (LAZY haha!) By the end of June, we will do an ultrasound re-check and go from there - if there’s enough improvement, we can start to incorporate walking under saddle. But we will see. I know the rehab is a very LONG and slow process that’s going to take me a year or longer.
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For reference, here is what I mean about her fetlock (and hock) angles not changing. I can’t find my 2009 photo at the moment but it was identical to these 2, one from 2012 and the other now (2024). She is a 2001 so she was 8 yrs old in 2009, 11yrs old in 2012, and is 23 yrs old now.
Just wanted to give everyone an update. Things went downhill quickly with my mare unfortunately…as it turns out, the vets are pretty positive she had DSLD which advanced EXTREMELY fast, and in addition the Bute she was on gave her ulcerative colitis that was not responding to the meds. We had to make the decision 2 days ago to let her go 
My heart is broken…
I’m so sorry for your loss 
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{{{{YellowPonyEventer}}}}
Susan
I’m really sorry. I know you tried a lot to help her. Be grateful for the good years you both had together. Hugs
