I have a rising 8 year old gelding who has competed up to training level Eventing. He was diagnosed with a chip in his coffin bone July 2018 when he presented as slightly lame (2/5). After approximately 3 weeks of treating for an abscess radiographs revealed a small chip at the base of the extensor tendon. Though it is possible that this has been there since I’ve owned the horse, we determined that it was the most likely cause of the lameness.
The gelding was put on box rest for 12 weeks, followed by rest with hand walking for 3 weeks before beginning rehab. He has nearly completed his rehab and is sound (knocking on wood!). Does anyone have horses that were able to return to their athletic careers following this injury?
I know of one who has returned to full work. It’s been a few years and he is completely sound and doing very well … dressage though, no jumping so don’t know about that.
This isn’t the same, so I don’t know if it will be helpful at all. But my TB broke his coffin bone two summers ago. Only sign was a minor lameness and it coincided with when he got new shoes. He’s sometimes a little funny about “high” nails (in his case high = where nails are supposed to go on everyone else), so we just assumed that was the issue. Took about a week for the lameness to go away and then he was back to sound on the flat. But over jumps he was still acting funny (shifting right over the jumps as though he wanted to avoid landing on his LF). We were in the middle of 3 weeks of showing, and so he got week one off. He started feeling normal midway through week 2, so we did some 1.40m classes at the end of that week. Then week 3 he jumped in two FEI Grand Prixes.
After the show he came home and we headed into winter as usual. On a whim I decided to do his every-couple-of-year foot x-rays to look at balance, and lo and behold, my vet sat back and said, “when did he break his coffin bone?”
I know it’s different with a chip, so again, it might not be totally relevant. But I can say that with my guy, a broken coffin bone barely slowed him down, and he’s still jumping around the big stuff.
Another not the same situations.
We bought an 8 year old horse that we were not told owner had trouble with abscesses.
Sure enough, horse had another abscess here.
Vet checked him, x-rays did show he had a crack offset from the front of his coffin bone.
Vet said hoof was it’s own cast for that kind of break.
Turn him out, watch for abscesses.
Other than that, leave him be for three months.
Then bring him and we will assess for progress.
Horse didn’t have any more abscesses.
At check-up was sound, x-rays did show break was healed.
We had long, long ago a horse that broke a wing of his coffin bone.
He was lame and put on a cast, twice.
It never did heal and he was never sound again.
You can see, each situation is different and have their own resolution, hardly two are the same.
With your horse with a chip, what will happen will depend if it reattaches.
If it floats around and if so, where it ends up and if there is other going on there, then what you may have there becomes more complicated.
If it goes into an articular surface or where soft tissues have to move, it may cause trouble there.
As long as it doesn’t, it should not interfere with anything much.
I think today with arthroscopic instruments they can take those out easily and look around, see what all in there looks like, if warranted?
Good luck that your horse’s chip reattaches without any trouble.
Another not the same situations.
We bought an 8 year old horse that we were not told owner had trouble with abscesses.
Sure enough, horse had another abscess here.
Vet checked him, x-rays did show he had a crack offset from the front of his coffin bone.
Vet said hoof was it’s own cast for that kind of break.
Turn him out, watch for abscesses.
Other than that, leave him be for three months.
Then bring him and we will assess for progress.
Horse didn’t have any more abscesses.
At check-up was sound, x-rays did show break was healed.
We had long, long ago a horse that broke a wing of his coffin bone.
He was lame and put on a cast, twice.
It never did heal and he was never sound again.
You can see, each situation is different and have their own resolution, hardly two are the same.
With your horse with a chip, what will happen will depend if it reattaches.
If it floats around and if so, where it ends up and if there is other going on there, then what you may have there becomes more complicated.
If it goes into an articular surface or where soft tissues have to move, it may cause trouble there.
As long as it doesn’t, it should not interfere with anything much.
I think today with arthroscopic instruments they can take those out easily and look around, see what all in there looks like, if warranted?
Good luck that your horse’s chip reattaches without any trouble.
Another not the same situations.
We bought an 8 year old horse that we were not told owner had trouble with abscesses.
Sure enough, horse had another abscess here.
Vet checked him, x-rays did show he had a crack offset from the front of his coffin bone.
Vet said hoof was it’s own cast for that kind of break.
Turn him out, watch for abscesses.
Other than that, leave him be for three months.
Then bring him and we will assess for progress.
Horse didn’t have any more abscesses.
At check-up was sound, x-rays did show break was healed.
We had long, long ago a horse that broke a wing of his coffin bone.
He was lame and put on a cast, twice.
It never did heal and he was never sound again.
You can see, each situation is different and have their own resolution, hardly two are the same.
With your horse with a chip, what will happen will depend if it reattaches.
If it floats around and if so, where it ends up and if there is other going on there, then what you may have there becomes more complicated.
If it goes into an articular surface or where soft tissues have to move, it may cause trouble there.
As long as it doesn’t, it should not interfere with anything much.
I think today with arthroscopic instruments they can take those out easily and look around, see what all in there looks like, if warranted?
Good luck that your horse’s chip reattaches without any trouble.
Curious, posted ONCE a long post, it came out as three posts, the middle one “unapproved”?
Deleted the last one, now ALL are gone?
Anyone else having troubles posting?
Every now and again one of mine will show up as “unapproved.” My guess is that something (though I don’t know what, as none of my posts have been anything out of the ordinary) flags it and a moderator has to approve the post. But I haven’t had anything singular show up as multiple posts. Weird.
@Bluey I’ve noticed my posts are more likely to be unapproved if they are long and include multiple links. But they usually appear after a few days when the moderator has had a chance to approve it. Annoying, but it happens.
I seem to be cursed with coffin bone fractures. Soooo many in my lifetime, all in race horses or ex-race horses.
I can honestly say coffin bone fractures involving the extensor process are not something I have personally dealt with. That adds another layer of complication. I’ve had good luck with chips, wing fractures, sagittal fractures, even fractures involving the joint and the horses have been sound for their original purpose.
