Tendon sheath infection, am I just delaying the inevitable?

[RhythmNCruise]

I also was going to ask if you had a university veterinary teaching hospital within a reasonable distance.

25 years ago my then 2-year-old gelding sliced his right hind on a high-tensile wire fence just a couple of inches below his hock. He almost degloved it completely and severed his extensor tendon and artery and had about two inches of exposed cannon bone.

Long story short, my normal vet was out of town and I got another vet there on emergency. She immediately referred me to NSCU Vet School and prepped him to travel (about 2 hours away). We got him there, he was there for a month, had a few surgeries, brought him home, had strict management of the wound, he went non-bearing lame, took him back, one more surgery to remove a section of necrotic tendon, he came back home, and he went on to be a lovely riding horse, won many blue ribbons (no jumping, but great AQHA under saddle horse), retired early, and was euthanized at 23 when he broke that same leg in the pasture during the night.

When I talked to my regular vet after he returned from being out of town, he said it was lucky he hadn’t been home because he would’ve told me to euthanize the horse. He was a good vet, but this type of injury was beyond him. It was not beyond NCSU School of Veterinary Medicine (and Dr. Rich Redding, who was the overseeing vet on my guy’s case).

It did cost a lot of money. Between the two stays at the vet school and multiple surgeries, plus the amount of medications and supplies we went through in the aftercare once we got him home, I blew through $10k (and that was 25 years ago). But that horse meant so much to me. He was a once in a lifetime horse.

Moral of the story…get a second opinion, and if there is a university with a veterinary teaching hospital within a day’s drive from you, consider taking him there. I will forever hold a special place in my heart for NC State Vet School for saving my boy and taking such great care of him.

ETA: Regarding the expense…$10k for all of that with a horse seems so reasonable to me know. Two summers ago my dog had to be hospitalized at an emergency/specialty clinic and have fluid drawn off his chest. He was there for…three days, I think? $7,000!!! For THREE DAYS. For a dog.

But that’s the other thing about vet schools. They are often more affordable AND are capable of doing more than a local clinic.

[ndirish07]

Not my horse, but a horse at my barn had a tendon sheath infection and lived to tell the tale. He managed to get a piece of corn stalk up through his frog (due to sulcus thrush–again not my horse and certainly not my farrier). Horse was 3 legged lamed for about a week because their farrier kept saying it was an abscess. It wasn’t. I kept suggesting to please actually call the vet who came out and realized it was worse than an abscess.

Somehow that corn stalk piece went alllll the way up and either perforated or just irritated the heck out of the tendon sheath and caused a raging infection. They didn’t take him to the clinic but the vet cultured it and flushed out the sheath every couple of days. Somehow this strategy worked out and the horse returned to work. The fetlock is still a little enlarged, but it worked. I don’t know how they didn’t need to take him in for IV antibiotics and a lavage.

I got drafted wrapping the leg and one night sure as the world there was about a 3" piece of corn stalk in the wrap. It migrated out the top by the fetlock. I never would have believed that was possible. The horse was dead lame and non weight bearing for about 3 weeks. No joke. And he’s a big 17.3 warmblood. I thought he was gone from either laminitis in the other legs or that infection, but nope. He’s sound and doing everything he was before and you’d never know he almost died.

Now if that was my luck that course of treatment would have never worked.