Horse is allergic to vaccines - what do you do?

[mfleming13]

My mare (who always has to be complicated) has had several very strong allergic reactions to vaccinations. It started a few years ago with a Flu/Rhino vaccine, had a mild case of hives but they cleared up without much trouble. Then the next time we did the Flu/Rhino vaccine she had one small hive appear about three hours after the vaccination and was acting a little bit colicky. She was laying in her stall quietly, not thrashing etc. and upon closer inspection I noticed she had more hives. I got her up to walk and not 15 minutes later she was COVERED in giant hives and was clearly distressed. We treated with dex and she was more comfortable a bit later. Hives remained for the next 12 hours and then went away. My vet at that point decided not to do that vaccine anymore and the next we gave her was the rabies vaccine. She had no reaction to that, and we went ahead the next time he was out (about 2 months later) and gave her the EWT/West Nile vaccine and she had another severe reaction, this time it took two rounds of dex to get her comfortable.

She is a horse that has a competitive career and I really want her to be able to get vaccinated so she can be protected. The current advice I have gotten (from different vets) is;

• To not give her any combination vaccines, and vaccinate one at a time.
• To not give her any vaccines except for the absolute necessary ones (which ones do you consider necessary?) my vet is saying rabies and maybe tetanus - what do you think?
• To do the vaccines anyway, and to watch her with an epi pen in hand in case it is needed

I am very, very nervous to vaccinate her again. Any stories/experiences you have about this would be great to hear. We have tried pretreating with banamine and dex also with no success. Another thing that may be worth noting is that she normally starts acting funny anywhere from an hour and a half - three hours post vaccine.

Thanks in advanced.

[trubandloki]

I have that same mare. (And my experience is not going to be any help, sorry.)
Her hive covered reaction lead to a laminitic episode. Not fun at all. Not sure if the laminitis was from the reaction to the vaccine or from the dex given to treat the reaction to the vaccine.

We tried just rabies last year, pre-treating with Banamine. Rabies caused a reaction too.

This year we are trying a different rabies vaccine, have to schedule that appointment.
Plan to pre-treat with Banamine and an anti-histamine.

[ShotenStar]

Interesting problem.

Have either of you contacted the manufacturers of the vaccines to see if there is a common ingredient in them that might be the source of the reactions? I.E., the carrier or the preservative used.

Have you or your vets reported these reactions to the manufacturers and/or the State Vet to see if these reactions are part of a larger pattern?

As for the bare minimum of vaccinations to give, rabies and tetanus would be on my list - rabies because there may be a legal requirement, depending on your location, and tetanus because it is such a nasty disease. The other drivers would be individual show requirements - some shows want proof of a strangles vaccination, others don’t seem to be that fussy. Most of the other vaccinations - Potomac Horse Fever, Eastern/Western Encephalitis, West Nile - are for things were you can either do some environmental controls to help prevent the disease (PHF) or where the herd immunity in your local area may help protect your unvaccinated horses.

star

[beau159]

If I would ever have a horse that would be THAT allergic to vaccines, I would simply not vaccinate them. If I was competing, I would take necessary precautions to limit my horse’s exposure to other horses.

Remember: Vaccines are only helping them possibly have immunity to certain sicknesses. It does NOT guarantee they will not get sick and vaccinations are certainly not required. Unless the shows you attend have certain requirements, all you really have to pay attention to is state requirements if you plan to cross state lines (some want a coggins, some want a health certificate, some don’t need anything).

You can easily run blood titers on your horse to see which vaccinations he doesn’t need anyway because he has enough anti-bodies.

If it were my horse, I wouldn’t vaccinate. It’s not worth the allergic reaction.

[MCF1991]

I also have a mare like this. She is our top broodmare too. Unfortunately, I don’t think you should vaccinate her for anything. We were instructed to not give our mare anything else and this was…gosh…maybe 12 years ago. So far, she has gone this long without ANY vaccines. Not even rabies. I currently have a gelding out of her who has no problems thank god because I show him.

I don’t know what advise to give since you said you show her. Hopefully every other horse at the show is vaccinated, but obviously there are always outbreaks of things so you’ll have to weigh that risk for yourself. Our mare is in a mostly closed heard and in fact not really local to many other horses or farms in general so it has remained unproblematic. I would certainly never dream of giving her anything ever again as the last time she almost died. Her reactions started out as hives as well, but wound up becoming more and more severe to the point we no longer take that risk.

[JB]

If you haven’t changed manufacturer, do that. Ft Dodge seems to have more reactions than others.

If you haven’t used different needles (I don’t remember what the non-allergenic variety is, but there is one) then do that.

At least start there

[skyy]

My daughter’s pony mare has a very weird, distinctive reaction to vaccines (and we can’t isolate it to a certain manufacturer or even a certain vaccine). She will start to slam her feet her to the floor, flehmen, scream, lay down and get up, and flip her head around. After a scary incident, the following spring we shipped her to Mid Atlantic Equine Clinic to have them administer vax in case it went bad. They pre loaded with banamine but she still had a the same (although milder) reaction. They said they had never seen anything like it. On their advice we now give her 5 days of Zyrtec, 2 times a day at 15 tabs per dose and 10 cc’s of banamine 1 1/2 hours before the injection and we only vax for R/F as she is a show pony.

[Simkie]

@JB

If you haven’t changed manufacturer, do that. Ft Dodge seems to have more reactions than others.

If you haven’t used different needles (I don’t remember what the non-allergenic variety is, but there is one) then do that.

At least start there

:yes:

Vetera vaccines are supposed to be “less reactive” than others.

Silicon-free needles are the same.

Good starting point!

[trubandloki]

@beau159

You can easily run blood titers on your horse to see which vaccinations he doesn’t need anyway because he has enough anti-bodies.

You can run titers but with horses there are no determined safe numbers. Some are assumed but…

[trubandloki]

@trubandloki

I have that same mare. (And my experience is not going to be any help, sorry.)
Her hive covered reaction lead to a laminitic episode. Not fun at all. Not sure if the laminitis was from the reaction to the vaccine or from the dex given to treat the reaction to the vaccine.

We tried just rabies last year, pre-treating with Banamine. Rabies caused a reaction too.

This year we are trying a different rabies vaccine, have to schedule that appointment.
Plan to pre-treat with Banamine and an anti-histamine.

I want to clarify something, the reaction the first year did not include rabies. I do not remember specifically what it was (have it written down, it is not handy). We typically split spring shots over two appointments and the first appointment she had no reaction (which included rabies), a month later things did not go so well.
A year later we decided to start with just rabies, nothing else, and it was no better.

The vet practice I use is very up to date so I assume they know about the various brands and such but I will ask when they are out.

[JB]

The vets may know of the various brands, but may not understand that some horses are sensitive, to downright allergic to one manufacturer’s adjuvants but not others.

Thanks simkie for the silicon-free! I was thinking that, then it sounded really wrong, so I erred on the side of caution lol And yes, I’d forgotten that my vet had also said that Vetera seems to elicit fewer adverse reactions, and she really prefers those over others, and REALLY doesn’t like to use FD unless there’s a good reason.

[EmilyM]

for those available intranasally, could you try that? my horse would always spike a fever from vaccines (no hives, etc), but he never does when it is done IN. Of course his reaction is much less severe. Just an idea.

[trubandloki]

@JB

The vets may know of the various brands, but may not understand that some horses are sensitive, to downright allergic to one manufacturer’s adjuvants but not others.

Thank you, I will clarify with them, but I truly have no doubt they know this.

[tabula_rashah]

Yes, definitely try the needle change. We had one gelding with major reactions and it turned out to be the silicone. Also the vet had us switch the horses to Calavenza (sp?) brand vaccines when possible as she said they had a good track record of not having as many reactions.

[JB]

@trubandloki

You can run titers but with horses there are no determined safe numbers. Some are assumed but…

This. Some challenge study was able to infect horses with “high enough” titers, and unable to infect some with “low” titers. All that’s really known is that some level of increase in the titer indicates a positive enough response to the vaccine, but the immune system is more complicated than that, and we know that even vaccinated horses can get diseases.

[sublimequine]

My mare doesn’t get hives, but gets colicky with vaccines. I only give one vaccine at a time, wait a week, then give the next one. She gets bute or banamine with every shot. My vet said to stay away from Fort Dodge brand shots, and suggested Merck or Boehringer Ingleheim (and I’m certain I totally massacred the spelling of that, sorry!).

EDIT: Also, I only give the AAEP core vaccines.

[JB]

Be aware that the use of NSAIDs before vaccinating can mean a reduced immune response, fwiw. Obviously getting a reduced response is better than not vaccinating, or getting a big reaction. Just know the horse might not be as protected, for as long.

[sublimequine]

@JB

Be aware that the use of NSAIDs before vaccinating can mean a reduced immune response, fwiw. Obviously getting a reduced response is better than not vaccinating, or getting a big reaction. Just know the horse might not be as protected, for as long.

That’s good to know, thanks JB.

[mfleming13]

Thanks everyone for your responses!
JB - I am aware that the use of NSAIDs as well as Dex can reduce the immune response, it is why I’m wondering if vaccinating her is even worth it in the first place. She absolutely has to be pretreated regardless.

I will look into using other brands - I am not sure what my vet is currently using, but planning soon to move my horses to an upper level eventer’s barn so hopefully his vet will be able to offer some more advice in regards to vaccinations.

I had not heard of the silicone free needles - is this only found with vaccine needles?

She did not have a reaction to her rabies vaccine (pretreated) and that was done in between two very big reactions - so hoping she is not allergic to that one. I’m not sure how that could be.

She received the strangles IN vaccine with no problems, and I think the flu vaccine can go IN. My current vet doesn’t like to use the flu IN vaccine… but switching soon. I am a bit worried because he continually wants to use combo vaccines even though every other vet has absolutely told me NOT to do that.

Luckily my mare doesn’t really go out with other horses, not due to her inability to get vaccinated, but just due to the fact she’s a bit nasty with her “friends” so she is very limited to germs from other horses in that sense. But there are a lot of environmental vaccines I do wish she could get. Hopefully we will get to the bottom of it soon! On another note, I should add this mare also has anhidrosis - not sure if that matters. However, she has recently started sweating and has sweat consistently for five days in a row! She also has extra teeth - and is allergic to vaccines. She is a special one… :lol:

[J-Lu]

My mare broke out in significant hives when she got vaccines (only when she moved to east TX and was around 10 years old), and we had to end up separating/staggering them. That solved the problem.

I would be very hesitant to not vaccinate a horse I was showing or simply a horse that I owned. Rabies and tetanus are terrible diseases and very easily avoided. Likely, rabies is “over-vaccinated” and titers are likely high in horses that are vaccinated yearly. Same with tetanus. However, horses live outside and are exposed to tetanus and potentially rabies. I’d be hesitant to take a horse to a show (esp a multi-day show) without current flu/rhino. If anything, I’d drop the strangles vaccine.