Kissing spine (bone shave) or retire?

[alteredcarbon]

I posted earlier about a project mare I have with some weird symptoms. Vet came out for a neuro exam, and lameness appointment. Neuro score was minimal, but weird. Due to the recent discussions here I had them X-ray her back - bingo, KS. Multiple places of overlap with changes.

Vet thinks the KS is symptomatic. Surgery was suggested, bone shave and not the ligament snip due to the extent of the KS. Vet thinks the type of KS she has is more than the less invasive options like mesotherapy injections or shockwave could touch.

I have decided I’ll either do the surgery and rehabilitate or just retire her here now. This mare isn’t young but isn’t old either, so I look at it as money invested in giving her the best chance to be useful. Retiring her (with or without surgery) will cost much more in the long run.

I would like to hear pros/cons, any experiences or suggestions on other things to look at. Money is a consideration but I am not necessarily on a tiny budget.

[Lunabear1988]

My horse was also just diagnosed but his isn’t as serious.

I do know horse in the barn that had the kissing spine surgery. I believe it’s a bone shave and lig snip. Surgery was in 2019 and he is doing training level eventing with a teenager. I do know that they continually do mesotherapy for him. Not sure if that includes other maintenance still or not.

Seems like for some successful and for some it’s not.

Best of luck! It really is a tough decision…

[LadyB]

IMO I would’ve done surgery if my horse was younger. When I was given the option, he was already 19, we already knew about the KS years prior, but maintained it and did well. Then some new signs showed up 6 years later. Since he was 19 I chose not to go through surgery. Did mestherapy and Cortisone injections. He’s been better than ever, with a new coach added to the mix, really getting him over his back, he’s doing wonderful.

Now, his wasn’t severe, and it can be managed. If its severe, I would do surgery depending on the age.

[OzarksRider]

@alteredcarbon

Retiring her (with or without surgery) will cost much more in the long run.

Why will retiring her cost more than rehabilitating her?

As I’m sure you already know, you can’t really generalize from others’ experiences to your own case because all cases of kissing spine are not alike and they don’t impact every horse the same way.

One of my horses has KS. I adopted him knowing he had this condition because I wanted a buddy for my riding horse. He had started bucking under saddle, so the rescue that had him tried different saddles and chiropractic. When that didn’t help, they took him to the vet school where he was diagnosed with KS. The vet advised that surgery was an option but the odds of success weren’t great, so the rescue decided to adopt him out as a pasture pet. He was 11 or 12 years old when he was diagnosed with KS and he is now 20. He has never had any treatment for KS, and he is completely comfortable retired to pasture. I’ve had him a little over 4 years now, and I have no regrets about adopting him.

Ask your vet a lot of questions about the proposed surgery and recovery. How long will it take to recover from the surgery? What will rehabilitation involve? Will she require ongoing maintenance therapy? Is your mare comfortable in the pasture without any treatment? If you don’t treat the KS is the condition likely to worsen? Or if you do the surgery is it likely to recur? You might even want to get a second opinion, just to cover all the bases.

[alteredcarbon]

@OzarksRider

Why will retiring her cost more than rehabilitating her?

Because as a useful horse (she is cute and quiet. Good basics), she can either do a job for me or be sold like I planned. If I sold her it would be with disclosure and the promise that she can come back to me at any point. Maintaining a retiree is expensive these days, no less than a riding horse, but I knew it was a possibility when I bought the mare. Vet estimates the surgery cost will be about a year’s worth of upkeep costs, so that is not a complete loss if it has a good chance of success.

[greywithchrome]

Join the kissing spine group on FB … many people with bone shave successes, but most people are within a few years out from the surgery. I personally did the lig snip surgery with my horse (7 spots) and ultimately it was a failure.

It’s a little interesting to me that your vet feels the KS is connected to the symptoms you were seeing. I would’ve never thought that.

[fivestrideline]

I have heard that horses with the lig snip aren’t staying in work long term (5+ years? Unsubstantiated number there). It seems that more people have had luck with the bone shave, but I also believe it is an “older” procedure.

Makes sense to me - healed/scarred tendon and ligament fibers tend to be shorter and more dense. If those snipped ligaments try to heal by laying down scar tissue, they might just shorten the whole thing back up. I have no evidence for this, just thinking out loud. AFAIK, bone doesn’t “grow back” quite the same way.

EDIT: I’m aware that the bone shave also includes the lig snip, but by removing bone (and in some cases, the entire process, apparently) you genuinely create more space. Perhaps that helps counteract any shortening due to the body’s attempts to heal the fibers.

[greywithchrome]

Mine never came back into work. I re-xrayed her 1.5 years after her surgery and it was literally identical to her x-rays from before her surgery. Which, my vet says means the surgery did work in a sense, because it didn’t get worse (there is no further rubbing). My horse is a Morgan with the big belly/weak core/dipped back sort of confirmation so to be honest, I am not entirely surprised, even though I worked really hard in the rehab stage.

[fivestrideline]

Ugh I’m sorry to hear that. I can’t imagine how frustrating it must have been

[alteredcarbon]

@greywithchrome

It’s a little interesting to me that your vet feels the KS is connected to the symptoms you were seeing. I would’ve never thought that.

I purchased her from an acquaintance and was able to use the same vet they did. There’s more to her symptoms than I posted. I just didn’t want to go into too many details.

We will do some more diagnostics before springing to surgery. But her KS is pretty severe. Lots of remodeling and signs of bone damage. I have spinal issues myself, and I get a twinge or pinch if I move wrong. It is extremely painful when it happens and causes me to hold tension. I also try not to move in certain ways because of it. Maybe I’m projecting a bit on this mare because I understand how it feels.

[Goose3699]

My old horse had kissing spine and I know that they got him a surgery then sent him to a rehabilitation swimming center and that seemed to have worked very well.

[barnesthenoble]

I am very, very skeptical of the bone shave surgery. I have not seen any long-term success stories (I also have not gone looking, so YMMV) and personally know of three unsuccessful rehabs from the surgery where the horses have not come back to riding soundness 18 mos - 2 yrs on, and one of those is more uncomfortable in his body now than he was before the surgery. Surgeries were done at two different (major, well-respected) hospitals by two different surgeons so it’s not a case of one crappy surgeon.

It’s a very invasive procedure that leaves a lot of soft tissue and bone trauma. I would not do it on one of my own horses.

I’m sorry you’re in this position, I know it sucks. Best of luck in whatever you decide to pursue.

[alteredcarbon]

I worry about long term. I’ve gotten a lot of very positive anecdotes from clients of multiple surgeons, but all of those horses are still in rehab stages. Jumping a bit, but just starting.

Talked to vet again and they said we could try a new shoeing set up, inject her SI and back, and see how that goes. But they were very guarded about that working long term.

I think I may join the KS group and scroll a bit. I’ll look for long term cases, positive or negative.

[Tee]

My guy had very mild KS and really his only symptom was a complete loss of control in his hind end, especially if we did any sort of bending work to the right. Normal KS rehab work actually made him much worse. We were able to get good results from two injections and then they quit working. He had the bone shave in 2017 and has done great since then. I don’t regret it at all.