Can anyone speak to the effectiveness or accuracy of an ultrasound immediately after an injury regarding soft tissue injuries? Barn owner saw my horse fall, horse was immediately was lame and vet was out within the hour to ultrasound leg.
Depends on the volume of swelling.
My vet has done this when the injury is potentially catastrophic or emergent, where even limited imaging might significantly change the course of treatment- ex. horse punctured hock, and if we knew the joint capsule was involved we were getting him on the trailer to New Bolton whereas if we didn’t have a reason to believe that he was better off getting stabilized at home until we knew what was going on. Vet came back for more imaging when the swelling had gone down.
1 Like
It depends on degree of swelling and what structure is damaged and how it is damaged. Some soft tissue fiber disruption will progress over the first few days to week but you might be able to tell something early on. Sometimes there’s so much swelling all you can see on ultrasound is the fluid.
1 Like
Oh and you might be able to catch a fracture on ultrasound that is difficult to see or impossible to capture on xray…been there unfortunately.
1 Like
Given how inexpensive an ultrasound is in the big scheme of most veterinary care, I wouldn’t mind having one of mine done immediately. In fact, I’ve only ever wished I’d done one sooner on more than one occasion.
4 Likes
I guess I’m hoping for a false positive. Not much swelling but horse lame upon flexion. Ultrasound showed something but vet warned me doing an ultrasound this early could be inconclusive either way. I’m doing further diagnostics at a large animal hospital next week. Horse has been stall rested and no heat/swelling so far. But I know suspensories are tricky.
Have you blocked? Another cheap, useful diagnostic.
Did you xray since the flexion was positive?
No since the original injury was at the suspensory branch. Vet just assumed it was in the general area.
We did not although I did ask vet to xray but she felt it was localized to the fetlock, so we passed.
So just to report back ultrasound
Right after an injury is not always an indicator of trama. I had the ultrasound done 3 weeks later and it was a completely different image. Yes it showed injury in that area but nothing like the first ultrasound.
1 Like
