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Lipomas

Horse Care
#1

Hello. I am looking for any information that could help me out. A geriatric horse at my barn was euthanized suddenly this past week from Lipoma strangulation. My vet explained to me that a horse can develop lipomas many years before they start having trouble- like a strangulation. He said it tends to develop in overweight horses that are fatty prone. I asked him what you do to prevent it and he said that it is important never to let your horse become obese.

My question to others, is what else can be done to prevent it? I’m so in a tizzy about it. My horse is half the age of the horse that died, but so much like him in many ways. Both Qh crosses with solid muscular builds and little feet. Both get fat on air alone.

The diet my horse is currently on is a handful of Triple Crown Lite, and free choice grass hay, plus all day turnout on grass. His supplements consist of Source (since he doesn’t get a lot of grain), a joint compound, and chromium (a metabolic booster).

He is on the “heavy” side because that is his build, but he isn’t Obese- but is prone to fatty spots around his neck and rump.

Any help is greatly appreciated.

#2

It doesn’t at all require a horse to be overweight, let alone obese, to develop this.

I lost my TB gelding to this as well :frowning:

It’s more common in geldings than mares. Some think that overall they are VERY common, the lipomas themselves, it’s just less common for them to grow in such a way as to get wrapped around intestines.

You can’t prevent them. My TB was never overweight.

#3

I agree with JB. I lost my 20 yr old TB gelding to a strangulated lipoma. He was not overweight.

He never had a bout of colic the 18 years I had him-until that horrible day. He was a healthy fit horse still in regular work.

The surgeon said that lipomas grow over time and may never cause a problem. In my gelding’s case, he probably rolled the wrong way during turnout and the rolling action combined with the weight of the tumor caused it to drop (it grows on a stalk), and wrap itself around the small intestine. The stalk then acts like an elastic band, strangulating the intestine. I’m not a vet but that’s basically how it was explained to me.

I was assured that there was nothing I could have done to prevent it nor did I do anything to cause it. My horse was perfectly fine one minute and the next, he was hospitalized in the worst pain imaginable.

#4

flaggy, my guy was 20 also. How strange.

The day my boy died - he’d been having some arthritis issues which were getting better. That morning, after breakfast, he had an extra gleam in his eye. He and his buddy went bucking and farting and galloping around the pasture, and I thought “I’m going to take a ride on the old guy this afternoon.” We went to early vote, it was a Saturday. By the time we got back, he was down and had been for a while :frowning:

I will always wonder if all that cavorting around is what made the lipoma flip around and strangle his intestines :frowning:

#5

This boy was 27 yrs. King of the 1 hour colic as his owner would say. But, she knew something was terribly wrong when an hour went by and the banamine hadn’t kicked in. The vet checked him at 5 and gave him more banamine and then had to go to more appts. By 7 (when I arrived), he was practically having a seizure, throwing himself against the wall, against the ground, sweating profusely. By 8, the vet came back, tried Rompum w/o success and he was put down in the snow behind the barn- surrounded by love. I’ve had horses for 20yrs and had never seen anything so violent.

So no one knows what causes these tumors? Its just like my dad who randomly had one develop on his spine, I suppose? (Thankfuly, still alive and well). Are there ways for early detection?

I suppose these are all questions I should ask my vet. My vet is a truly, kind-spirited and very knowledgable man. Reminds you have those James Herriot novels. But, he’s not very talkative and it can be like pulling teeth getting info out of him.

#6

We had an old TB gelding who we saved with surgery for lipomas. He had been a rescued, thin boy about a decade before we got him and always had a problem keeping weight on. He ate like a king and stayed lean! We joked after his surgery that all his fat went into the fatty lipomas in his gut. He was around 20 yrs old when he had his surgery.

He had 2 bouts of gas colic in the space of 3 weeks with no colic history at all. He responded to treatment both times and we were brain storming what could have caused this condition, when he had a 3rd milder bout…so off to Marion duPont Scott Vet Hospital we went. He stabilized and was comfortable, so they did surgery the next morning (exploratory because they could not see the lipomas with diagnostics done that night). We were shocked when they pulled a cantaloupe sized lipoma out of his gut, and 2 or 3 walnut sized ones. We were told he could have died at any time if any of the lipomas had flipped over (as described by the poster above)

The old man bounced right back on schedule, and went on to take my daughter to her pony club B test and schooling Prelim the following summer. He lived to be 27 years old.

**Meant to add, we were told it usually happens that lipomas are found in horses in their 20’s and older. I suppose it takes that long for the fat to accumulate to make up these fatty tumors.

#7

I, too, have wondered what causes lipomas.
MY TB gelding was 11 when he had a colon resection at Marion DuPont Scott hospital. His was 8 inches. He, too, has always been on the thin side.
I had fed him high-fat grain, plus Omega horseshine and wondered if that contributed.
Oddly, I had jumped him the day before for the first time that spring, and he was perfect. The next day he colicked.
He did colic mildly three times before over about a year. Each time I had brought him out with Banamine.
I’ve read lipomas start causing trouble when a gelding is about 10.

#8

My boy was also at the EMC in Leesburg. He had been turned out in the morning and was fine. I received a call at 2pm that he was “rolling and wouldn’t get up”. The BO wasn’t that knowledgeable but she kept saying “he doesn’t look like himself”. As we were talking she said he was “thrashing”. She called the vet and I drove to the barn faster than I’ve ever driven in my life.

What I found brought me to tears. I couldn’t even hear what the vet was saying. My horse was SHAKING and TREMBLING so severely that he could barely stand. By that time, the vet had given him all the usual drugs for pain and spasm. He had cuts on both sides of his head near his eyes where he had been thrashing and hit his head on the ground. He was covered with grass and sweat. My horse was always stoic, always quiet, never complained, never showed that he was uncomfortable. Here I was literally trying to support him so he’d stay on his feet. I was in a state of shock.

He wasn’t getting better so we took him to the EMC. Originally they thought he had anterior enteritis or “grass sickness”. He was severly depressed and had lots of reflux. To make a long story short, when it was apparent that it wasn’t enteritis he went into surgery. I was sitting there in the waiting area planning on how I was going to take care of him, where he’d go when he recovered, etc.

That never happened. Fifteen minutes after he went in one of the vets came out and told me that they couldn’t help him. His cecum burst and he has severe peritonitis due to a strangulating lipoma. They put him down on the table. That was one of the most traumatic days of my life. I honestly kept saying “he was just fine, what happened?” It was the ultimate nightmare coming true for me. He was my horse of a lifetime (Flaggy).

#9

“They” feel that fatty tumors are not uncommon at all - they just develop, maybe a genetic predisposition, not sure, the last I checked. I don’t know if it has anything to do with color, though all the ones I knew, including mine, were black-based. Mine was bay, one at the barn was bay, the other was a very very dark bay. Small sample, obviously!

You can’t detect them unless you’re doing exploratory surgery :wink:

#10

Last year we lost a 23 year old horse very much the same way. I noticed that horse was frantic in his pen and upon further evaluation determined that this was VERY serious. It was quite violent as he was throwing himself into the pipe panels and had bloodied his legs. He was such a gentleman because when I took him out he ceased all violent behavior even though I knew it still hurt just as bad. :frowning: We called the vet and she knew right away, gave banamine but called the owners and told them the news. They didn’t do surgery and I think that was for the best. The vet did a necropsy which I was able to observe and you could see exactly what had happened. The intestine had flipped and caught on one of the lipomas and then it distended right behind the “stuck” area, blowing up like a balloon so that there was no way for it to dislodge itself. :no: It was very interesting being able to see that right after the fact, the vet made a good call. She said they don’t know why some horses get them, so if you figure it out, you can make a ton of $$ and save a lot of horses. Sorry you had to witness that, it’s not for the faint of heart. <hugs> :sadsmile:

#11

I have known a few to have them. All of them older, over 20, arabs. The 2 most recent were chestnut and grey, so not sure about the color thing. I thought it was an arab thing. I lost my old boy, a bay arab, to a rupture that sounds so similar to your story Flaggy. The vets suspected a lipoma, but we didn’t do a necropsy. The rupture was confirmed by ultrasound and a belly tap, so they knew they couldn’t attempt surgery. He had the same trembling and sweating. He went from mildly colicky to soaking wet head to tail and shaking within a minute.

From everything I have seen and heard, there is nothing to do to prevent them, and no test ahead of the colic. I’m sorry for everyone that has lost a horse to it. It’s horrible to feel helpless.

#12

I am new here and this thread actually promted me to join, just so I could respond. I lost RJ, my 26 year old Arabian gelding about four years ago…my vet diagnosed lipoma, but we chose not to do a necropsy. I have always wondered and secretly felt so afraid that there was something I could have done to prevent it…something that I missed. Reading here has shed some light and given me a little bit of peace, actually. He had two episodes of colic as a younger horse, pretty mild, and it never happened again. But those experiences were nothing at all like what I saw on that day. It is exactly like so many of you described. It was so terrible and so violently painful for him…the trembling and shaking and sweating. He was literally out of his mind with pain. When the Banamine and Rompum didn’t do much other than take the edge off, we knew that something was very seriously wrong.

(I can’t write about it without crying, even now. I miss him terribly.)

Just for discussions sake about color…he was a fleabitten grey who was a beautiful blood bay as a young horse.

#13

I’ve seen a couple–both chesnut TBs, a mare and a stallion, both in their early 20s, seemingly healthy, no history of colic–suddenly colicking very, very severely. There really isn’t anything you can do to prevent it, and unless surgery is an option, nothing you can do to treat it but euthanize. It’s heartbreaking–the hour it took the vet to get there to put down my mare was the longest of my life. She didn’t respond at all to either xylazine or banamine–it took torbogesic (which we didn’t, of course, have on hand) to make her comfortable enough to stand for the exam.

#14

I’m sorry :frowning: It’s been 4 years for me too. It IS a terrible thing knowing they were in SO much pain. Rest easy that there was very very very likely you could have done NOTHING to save him.

Just for discussions sake about color…he was a fleabitten grey who was a beautiful blood bay as a young horse.

Interesting.

#15

I also lost a horse to strangulation of the small intestine from lipomas. Yes , my horse was over weight most of his life, but it was explained to me that horse’s of color are more prone. He was an overo paint. He had never been sick a day in his life until that final day. I did have an autopsy performed because I had to know what caused him to colic. It was 20 yrs. ago but I remember it like it was yesterday. My vet even took pictures of the lipomas so I could see them in the abdomen. My horse was loaded with them.

#16

[QUOTE=JB;3830523]
I’m sorry :frowning: It’s been 4 years for me too. It IS a terrible thing knowing they were in SO much pain. Rest easy that there was very very very likely you could have done NOTHING to save him.

Interesting.[/QUOTE]

It’s been a little over two years for me. In so many ways it feels like a lifetime ago. My boy was chestnut. I’m sorry for everyone that’s had to go through this. Lipomas are silent killers… It’s unbelievable to watch your beloved horse go through such agony. It was such a beautiful day the day this happened. Maybe he felt so good he decided to have a really good roll. Only to get up and feel such agony.

#17

My deepest sympathies to all of you who have lost a horse to this.

I recently purchased a horse…even though after RJ’s death, I pretty much said, “Never again.” He was a once in a lifetime horse.:sadsmile: As a friend of mine put it, “my other husband”:wink: And so I have taken a deep breath and begun again with a little mare. I am more than a little bit paranoid about colic, however. I cannot sleep without heading out to the barn before bed, just to make sure she is content and sleeping and ok.

#18

Isn’t that just salt in the wound? :frowning: It was early November for me, the Saturday before the real election day, and it was just beautiful, in the 70’s. Sucked.

#19

I lost my Sam (the original Sha Samour) to this almost 2 years ago. He was 29, just a few months shy of 30. He was fine in the morning when he was turned out, but my trainer called me at 1:00 in the afternoon that he was colicking. He was gone by 4:30. By the time I got from work to the barn, the vet had been there once to tube him, but he was down again, rolling, sweating… my God, it was horrible. I knew I had no other choice, and it was my final promise to Sam, that I wouldn’t let him suffer. He wasn’t obese, but he was in good flesh. My vet had said more than once that Sam was a candidate to live to 40.

I had never heard of a lipoma prior to that awful day. My vet told me it was not uncommon, especially in geriatric horses. For whatever it’s worth, he was also an Arab. I’d had Sam for 15 years, and it still hurts. I don’t know what can be done to prevent these… I don’t think there’s anything I could have done differently…

I feel for all of you who have lost a horse the same way.

#20

See, that’s the thing, you can’t. It seems that they are probably very prevalent, but there’s no way to know for sure without opening up the horse. I think that feeling has probably developed after finding them common in horses, geldings moreso than mares, older horses moreso than younger, when they are on the table for other reasons. Usually they are not a problem. They are benign, in and of themselves, so are not cancerous.

I feel for all of you who have lost a horse the same way.

You too, it sucks. I wear his tail bracelet almost every day :slight_smile:

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