My mare has many nagging ongoing issues including possible PPID, mild diarrhea when not on Bio Sponge, and arthritis. Her right hock has always “wringed” (not sure if that is the proper term when the hock rotates at the walk). Her poor hind end conformation is catching up with her now and there is discomfort.
She gets a 1/4 of a Previcox daily but it’s not doing much at that dose anymore. Can I safely give her 1/2 a pill? She’s a big girl at 17 hh and at 16 years old is not thriving.
What would the next course of action be for pain management without breaking the bank. Legend injections, hock injections…?
Which size pill - the big 227mg one or the small 57mg one? Because there is a big difference in dosage of just a 1/4 of a pill. Anyway, I think that’s an excellent question for your vet.
Speaking as a horse owner wiho spent a career in pain control pharmacology.research, particularly NSAIDS; I am not a vet.
Best pharmacologic pain control is achieved with the highest possible dose of the safest category of drugs. In this case it’s Equioxx. I’d discuss with your vet increasing the NSAID dose up to the maximum. If that maximum dose srill is not effective for the pain control your mare needs, then add something else on top of that maximum dose.
That something else may be Legend, or Adequan, or supplements, or intra-articular corticosteroid injections, or something else your vet deems appropriate.
My 14.2 barely hand mare took a quarter of the 227mg pill. Id talk to your vet about upping thw dosage. Mine got no pill every sunday. My vets theory was it gave her liver a break?
Have you taken her for a lameness exam?
Did you do x-rays?
Previcox/Equioxx would NOT be my first line choice for pain management. I agree it can be very useful (as I’ve got 2 or my 3 horses on it) but it needs to be used for the right reason and in conjunction with other treatment therapies, based on what problems the horse has.
For example, your horse might respond to hock injections, and then you won’t even need the Previcox/Equioxx. Keep in mind that while the NSAID tends to have low side effects, it is still a medication and can still cause side effects.
I have always been told by both lameness vets I use that three 57 mg tablets should be given on the first day as a loading dose, and then one 57 mg tablet every day thereafter, as close to the same time as possible each day, avoiding missing days if possible.
That’s interesting, I’ve never been instructed to give a loading dose, and have always been told by vets to only give it six out of seven days each week.
My understanding is that the medication needs to reach a therapeutic level in the system to work its best and then be maintained at that therapeutic level. The loading does is not absolutely necessary but it does get the horse to the therapeutic level faster.
For my horses, dosing it this way, it seems like it starts helping them after about 1 week.
What is your vet’s reasoning for only giving it 6 days out of 7?
