Soft Tissue Injury

[islandequestrian]

Hi guys!

At the beginning of Nov 2020 (Nov 3), my horse was sedated to get clipped. The day after, she came up off in her hind end… Just the odd step seemed off, not fulling extending underneath herself.

It’s now been over two weeks, a massage and red light treatment later, and she’s still not quite there. There’s a strangles issue here right now, so vets are a hot commodity.

Does anyone have any experience with rehabbing a soft tissue injury? That’s what the massage therapist thought it might be.

[joiedevie99]

Personally, if there is a risk it might be a soft tissue injury, I’d be conservative until you can get a vet out to ultrasound. Stall rest, with hand walking a few times per day.

[Abbie.S]

Well, rehab of soft tissue usually involves rest and a slow work-up back to the horse’s previous level of work…but how extensive that rest is, for how long and how long your work-up to the old level of work is depends a lot on what structures are affected and how badly

So we could be talking anything from simply kicking them out onto somewhat restricted turnout for a couple weeks followed by a few weeks of low level work, to straight up stall rest for months w/ topical steroids, Bute and cold-hosing and then several months of hand walking and tack walking.

The only way to know is to identify what soft tissues are involved and the extent of the damage. You generally need diagnostics for that, or at least a basic work-up by a vet.