Would you buy a horse with a sarcoid?

I had one that had a smaller one in that exact spot. We did surgery to remove it - they cut big margins on it and it hasn’t returned - 3 years later.

I was horrified when it showed up - it was at a show and my white sheepskin girth was soaked in blood from irritating it. We went straight in the trailer and to the clinic across the street and had it cut off that day.

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I had one surgically removed on a horse and I wish I had never done it. The surgeon assured me it was the only way to go and that he got clean margins. That sarcoid came back WAY bigger and it was ANGRY. It grew to be huge and it wept. :frowning_face: It wasn’t in a place where it would interfere with riding, but it was extremely ugly and I can’t imagine it wasn’t in some way uncomfortable for the horse. I swore if I ever encountered a sarcoid again, I would either leave it completely alone or do topical/injectable treatment only.

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My experience also involved a seller not disclosing the sarcoids until after I flew to try the horse and my experience is that if the seller omits one thing… they may be omitting others and it’s better just to walk. Lesson learned.

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Yup. It can happen. I have a cat with a bovine sarcoid on her snout. I fought my vet tooth and nail about surgery. I won. We settled on a treatment that combined some equine knowledge and one tiny paragraph in a journal written by a German vet. LOL! Cat is still happy years later after months of cimetidine and azithromycin that shrunk that bugger to almost flat. An acquaintance who got a cat from a rescue luckily saw good results with the same treatment (although she had an absolute nightmare with the pharmacy in her town) after the rescue insisted on several surgeries … after which (totally predictably for cats + bovine sarcoids) it came back quicker and angrier every time.

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My gelding has had two removed from his sheath. Both were nerve wracking experiences. He is the best.boy.ever and I’d do anything for him but I also would not purchase a horse with a large one. Let the seller sort it out.

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When he was 25 my gelding developed a small lesion on his belly. It looked like a pea with wrinkled black skin. Neither our retired or new vet had ever seen one. The new vet removed it with very large margins, as you do in people with skin cancer.

It was diagnosed as a cutaneous hemangiosarcoma - very unusual in horses. It was tested at 2 labs. The vet and I thought the diagnosis at the first one was somewhat tentative. We sent it to MIchigan State’s lab and they confirmed the Dx with a more thorough discussion. The vet also consulted an oncolocy specialist at Colorado State (her alma mater) who said that since it was confined to the cutaneous (skin) tissue it was most likely gone forever but I should keep an eye on the area. I couldn’t find any signs of it other than the scar when he had his summer coat. We had to put him down for a knee problem when he was 28, but there were so signs of any additional sarcomas or sarcoids.

Sarcomas aren’t seen much in horses. My retired vet was in practice for 50 years in Maine and never saw one. It is worth doing some online research. If they are inside the body in an organ, for instance, they can metasticize and become fatal. If they are confined to the skin and haven’t invaded the muscle, as in my gelding, they don’t have a way to metasticize to other areas.

This is the type of lesion that I would not fool around with. It is a type of malignancy. I wouldn’t try a sequence of treatment options. Most vets probably have never seen one. If it can be removed and sent to a lab it should be done as soon as possible. I was fortunante I was dealing with a growth confined to the skin. It could have been something much worse.

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