My retired horse has had two episodes of acting colicky in the past month. Both were almost exactly the same. He paws, lies down and gets up, rolls and just acts like he’s very uncomfortable. This morning he was dropped but acting like he couldn’t pee. The first time it happened I called my vet, she recommended banamine and that seemed to resolve things. We put him on ulcergard for two weeks anfter and he had been fine.
It’s been almost exactly a month, and he did the same thing this morning so I called my vet to come see him. He had drank well over night and had normal piles and pee spots. Gave him banamine again since he seemed to be so uncomfortable, but of course he was fine by the time she got here. In fact he was out in the field running away from us as he did not want to be caught. All vitals were perfectly normal, as was the rectal exam. He peed and pooped normally as well. She took a sample to for a fecal and suggested 1) scoping for ulcers and 2) doing a powerpak.
We’ve made no changes to grain or hay, and he’s out for ~12 hours on grass and in over night. We talked at length about a strangulating lipoma. She told me that those are normally extremely painful with more violent symptoms and will not resolve with banamine. She also told me horses with SL typically don’t respond well to sedation for the rectal exam because they are in so much pain. Of course no way to diagnose that until and unless they go to surgery.
He is a 23 year old warmblood gelding with PPID, but otherwise healthy. Just old and retired. I’m planning to do the power pack and start him back on ulcergard (sigh). Not sure it’s worth scoping him as the treatment will be the same, and he doesn’t really have any reason to have ulcers. What am I missing?
