Seven went swimming today. They put him the back of an SUV so he could lie down and brought him to a place that has a water treadmill. It doesn’t take long to get there but they’ll probably take him a couple times a week.
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I saw that this morning. How cute. He was so curious about the water. That may be his saving grace to build some muscle without stressing his legs. I am glad they are able to do that.
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Second time in the water treadmill. He’s been getting physical therapy several times a day moving his knees and hocks in the right directions. He’s supposed to get body clipped this week 
. She says next time he goes to the treadmill his vet’s coming too and will do physical therapy in there.
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As someone who has been through a similar situation (not as premature but had other complicating factors so faced a lot of the same issues)… you go day by day. If I would have known the first night what my total hospital bill was going to be, I would have felt like I didn’t have a choice but to euthanize our foal. They honestly didn’t expect him to make it, so we went one day at a time. When he was still alive the next day, he got plasma. When he was still fighting the next day, we took the x-rays, etc. In the case being talked about here, money isn’t an issue, but they seem to be very aware of the outlook for his future. His legs look rough now, but it is incredible how much can change once they’re allowed some activity. For the sake of education, I’m glad she shares everything and I hope he’s able to have a comfortable future.
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Well she’s addressed a comment from someone saying he should be put down because of quality of life
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He’s a prey animal that can’t get away from predators and fully reliant on humans. No other horse interaction for a herd animal. He’s basically an orphan foal and those are tough when they get older.
I don’t think his quality of life is very good. Medically he is being treated every way, but he’s not a human.
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there’s a similar case study of a 280 day foal that seemed to have been better developed as it was able to suckle normally and have splints removed after two weeks. It still didn’t end well, but it explains a lot of the challenges. http://www.ijvm.org.il/sites/default/files/berlin.pdf
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I got an account suspended message when clicking on that link.
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Weird. It comes right up for me and I certainly don’t have any special access. I just googled and found it.
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Here’s the gist:
A mix breed filly was born after only 280 days of gestation in a spontaneous delivery. The filly was small, had a weak suckle reflex, very thin hair coat, severe tendon laxity and carpi valgus but was bright and alert and without respiratory difficulties. The filly was treated with plasma and prophylactic antibiotics and was fed via an indwelling naso-esophageal tube until she was able to suckle from the mare at the age of 2 weeks. The cause for the premature parturition was not determined, however, placentitis was highly suspected due to the apparent precocious in utero maturation of the filly that allowed for her survival without severe complications during the neonatal period. The filly consequently suffered from a traumatic fracture of the third metatarsal bone in the left hindlimb at the age of 3 weeks, which was treated conservatively with external fixation and healed. As a yearling, she developed severe degenerative joint disease in the left shoulder joint which was attributed to osteochondral changes that may have been related to her prematurity. The degenerative changes and chronic severe left forelimb lameness resulted in severe angular limb deformities in both front limbs which eventually led to the euthanasia of the filly at the age of 2.5 years. This case may suggest that severe developmental orthopedic deformities may be a late sequel of prematurity that may eventually hinder the long term survival.
Keywords: Foal, Premature, Placentitis, Developmental Orthopedic Diseases, Angular Limb
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Very interesting. And this foal might also eventually end up being put down.
However. I think the two were treated very differently. Seven was kept very immobile for most of his 3 months. And they’ve kept him in casts for quite some time and just recently replaced the casts with splints. He never spent much time suckling on the mare due to the keeping him off his feet.
They are concerned with Seven’s leg development and muscle development. I’m glad it’s not me that ended up with this foal, but if it had been me, he would have been put down immediately as I don’t have that kind of money. I am interested to watch this play out as I don’t think Seven is at a point of euthanasia and if he lives and grows, I think he’ll have a good life as a pasture pal.
The mare is in foal again, so I’m interested in seeing if she carries that one to a normal birth date. I think she’s had other foals, but I really don’t watch videos for more than a few seconds and contrary to what it looks like, I don’t follow Katie religiously, she’s just another poster whose videos catch my eye (again, for a few seconds). I find Seven’s story interesting, so when she posts an update on him, I watch (and share) that video.
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Someone sent this screenshot to me recently.
Again, remind me why we’re putting this poor horse through this? Surely the income from social media views isn’t enough justification. 
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It seems that she and the vets believe that he ultimately can have a life worth living. Reasonable people may disagree. But I dont think money or internet views are the reason here.
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That’s from the video of his second day on the treadmill. He just got out after being in the water for about 5 minutes and is being dried off. I know it’s a pain to watch the entire videos and listen to all the chat, especially because she has to go over the initial talks at the beginning of each video so I try to recap the video when I post them.
In my opinion they are doing all they can to ensure he’s growing as well as he can. He’s still at the vet clinic so I’m sure he’s got knowledgeable people keeping an eye on him.
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So few people can afford gold standard care in a situation like this. I suspect this will turn into a fascinating case study for veterinary students, and hopefully some good lessons for treatment of other cases will come from this.
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I don’t know her from Adam, but KVS at least seems to be grounded in reality about the chances of this guy. She does a lot of explaining to non-horsey (or… less educated) people, but also hasn’t shied away from the realities of livestock or used the unfortunate losses she’s had for clout, money, or weird sympathy (no TTHW flower crowns and posing with dead animals here).
I don’t think she’s one to prolong life just to prolong it - if the vet team is happy with his QOL then I hope he can also give them some unique experience in such a tough case. It will remain to be seen, of course.
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IF that were the case, the respectable thing to do would be to fight the battle privately and release the saga once it’s come to a conclusion.
It’s one of the rare times I’ll give kudos to Fallon Taylor (mentioned previous in this thread). Her million dollar NFR mare went through colic surgery a few years ago. The mare had to survive the surgery and then come back through a lengthy recovery period. Fallon didn’t mention a WORD of this on any of her socials until there was a true story to tell.
Contrast even just the first minute and a half of Fallon’s Unfiltered to all of these posts from Katie. https://youtu.be/MWiYxvOL8hk?si=XLVVFzotVV_w9LOT The way the Unfiltered story is told is the gold standard; otherwise it just feels exploitative.
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That is your personal opinion and not one that everyone shares.
When I lost a foal this spring, I didn’t hide any of it from my friends, family, or social media followers. I don’t have anywhere near Katie’s audience size, but my farm page has about 750 followers, and a large portion of those people follow it/me specifically because they have become “fans” of my little palomino mare, who is the one who lost her foal. I share all the ups and downs of my breeding adventures; I don’t sugarcoat anything. Maybe it’s because I was an educator for a decade, but I don’t see anything wrong with sharing the realities of life as a horse breeder.
I don’t know Katie personally, but I do know that she was extremely wealthy well before her social media presence became monetized. She does not “need” the money or views she gets from people following Seven’s case. Is this the path I would have personally chosen with a foal? No. But, then, it wouldn’t be a financial option for me regardless of my feelings about the situation.
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I agree. The information she’s shared about what’s happened with Seven would have helped me tremendously in the early days with our foal (but he was born a month and a half prior). I’ve shared a lot about ours because I feel like I would have benefitted a lot from other people’s experiences if they’d been shared. In response to the screenshot… here are a couple photos of mine. First photo is at 3 weeks old and it was scary to watch him walk unsupported, like his leg was just going to snap off. He is now perfectly straight in front, and strong. It’s incredible how baby legs can improve with the correct care.
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After discovering this thread and watching a bunch of her videos on TikTok, I noticed that there was indeed at least one veterinary student commenting on them about how they would be following along.
This is how I feel, too. I wouldn’t be in the position to afford this kind of care, and I am not sure I would do it even if I could, but she can afford it. I didn’t know her from Adam until this thread, but when her followers wanted to start a GoFundMe, she politely declined and said her following on social made her more than enough money to be able to cover the costs of the foal’s care and rehab.
Overall, her videos aren’t really my cup of tea, but I do think they are realistic, and have the potential to help her followers understand that breeding horses can be risky and isn’t all cute foals and loving, nickering mamas.
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