He is shod! All four with studs - I just still don’t want to walk him across the icy path if I don’t have to. I don’t think anyone at my barn goes out in the winter because of it unfortunately.
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Actually thank you for pointing this out - we work super closely with our vet (she used to board with us and is great friends with all the boarders!) so she knows him very well, but I haven’t taken updated neck rads in a while. I assume he prefers not to frame up because of the neck. It’s tricky, because I don’t want to make him uncomfortable through his neck by asking him to carry himself correctly but also don’t know for sure how damaging it is to his back to let him stick his head out a bit. I could have her watch him under saddle for a minute the next time we’re riding together.
I should really be getting updated hock radiographs too, so maybe I’ll get updated hock and neck rads all at once for him.
Just a note on adequan and zycosan that they work differently than legend so I would add one of those in addition to legend. I’ve also had good luck with oral lubrysin. It’s absorbed before it hit the stomach and adds lubrication to arthritic joints.
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My mare has pssm so keeping her in consistent work is the key to keeping her comfortable. Also she struggles in the summer, so she gets summers off (or 10 minutes walk/trot), then a fitness program in the fall. Right about now, she does the best… but still limited in the duration of our rides and exercise intensity. We are doing some small jumps at the start of our rides and that she does okay with but when she starts swapping leads behind, we know to stop the jumping/canter work. She seems pretty happy with the current routine.
I’ll have to look into it further-I truthfully don’t know much about adequan or zycosan so I need to do a little more research to decide what to try!
I really like the idea of this for me lol. I don’t really enjoy flatting him that much because of his neck (he clearly doesn’t enjoy it either) so if I just hop on him, do a few cavalettis, small jumps or poles on his “flat” days then that would keep the both of us happy I think.
I’m glad a few people have said doing this most rides is ok - I was a little worried it’d be too much but someone else above pointed out that the really small stuff isn’t much harder on their joints at all than regular flatting.
Whatever I can do to keep him moving at a speed higher than a walk for a little bit most days but with his ears still forward and happy is what I want! Maybe I can play around with doing some brideless stuff or something too-since he’s a lazy type I certainly don’t worry about him taking off with me lol.
I understand about the ice! I can get out back to our trails, but the driveway is now ice where the snow was packed down so I’m not going out to the front field even with studded hoof boots.
Feel what he’s doing with his back when you let him hold his head where he wants. With my horse I don’t ask for much, but I will pick up the reins for a few steps of leg yield or shoulder in as a reminder to lift his back if he’s getting flat. Making sure he’s not cheating on the bending (inside hind has to come up under his body) helps as well. It’s not his second level dressage lift, but it stops the inversion that comes from allowing him to trail his hind legs out behind. This would be more difficult to do if his restricted joint was in a hind leg instead of his knee.
Although to be completely honest, there comes a time when the decision is between making them do things they’re unhappy doing (but help keep them stronger) and letting them move in the way they’re most comfortable (and just accepting that it’s all downhill from there). My QH had an inoperable, fixed bone chip in one hock and I had to do endless stifle exercises with him to keep his stifle strong enough to take the strain of protecting his hocks. Eventually I did decide that since neither of us enjoyed it, and it was just slowing the slide to his end, I was going to let him enjoy himself for the last part of his life. We just toodled around doing as much, or as little, as he felt like doing. He came out of his last winter shockingly weak in his hind end and I decided then that I wasn’t going to put him through another winter.
My current senior has a general need to move to manage his health conditions, so it’s not quite the same. Yet, anyway. That knee may become the major limiter in time.
I’d probably start woth adequan, but also, how about putting him on firocoxib/previcoxx? A daily anti inflammatory might be just the ticket.
Also, I’ve found Osphos to be very helpful for a navicular horse. It helps relieve a lot of other bone pain things, too. Would I give it a 4 year old, no. But for an older horse, it’s worth a go, handled judiciously.
I have considered putting him on equioxx every day for maintenance, and I’m not particularly against it-but I’m worried that it will upset his stomach. I usually try and give him preventative ulcergard whenever he’s on it as advised by my vet, so that would get expensive fast haha.
Thank you guys for the suggestions! I am going to ask my vet again about Adequan and possibly give it a go if I can afford it right now.
I also just had his ACTH / insulin levels tested this morning just in case. I noticed a couple of months ago that his weight and topline had gotten worse with no changes in workload or feed (he gained weight back easily when I bumped up his feed a bit) and recently while doing the flatwork he’s been a lot harder to keep forward about halfway through the ride. He’s probably fine, but since he is turning 18 I might as well get it checked out just in case.
FWIW, mine has been on daily equioxx for at least 5 years with no ill-effects. I do give him Aloe Vera pellets (Smartpak Smart and Simple) to help buffer his stomach, but they are quite inexpensive.
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how much equioxx do you give him? Just one pill (I think 57 mg) a day?
Yes. It just goes in his grain baggies.
Bear in mind that if you were to decide to do Osphos, the horse absolutely must be off equioxx for 5 days before and 5 days after that treatment.
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I’ve known quite a few horses who have been on Equioxx/firocoxib with no problems. Unfortunately my delicate flower of a horse had tummy troubles when I decided to give it a try. He became a bit touchy for blanketing within a couple weeks and it continued to get worse for a week even after stopping giving him the Equioxx. I’m now treating him for ulcers which it’s possible he had prior to giving him Equioxx even though he didn’t seem symptomatic in any ways that I’ve noticed in the past and this just made it worse. It did work very well for helping him to feel better and I could definitely tell the difference so it works great. I would try it in the future for a different horse. I’ll be going back to Adequan which is what I’ve done in the past for him.
You should take the horse off Equioxx and let it flush out of the system every so often. I was doing 5 days every month without. And you should run a kidney panel at least once a year if the horse is on regular Equioxx. My vet practice has seen several aged horses on daily Equioxx go into kidney failure and they are suspicious Equioxx was a contributing factor.
I’ll think on that. I put him on it briefly for the first winter that I found out his hocks were fusing (he was 12 at the time) and it definitely helped but haven’t used it that consistently since-only for a few days following injections. I could certainly give it a shot and see how he does on it!
Do you have literature for this?
I am confused or behind the times. If his hocks are fused, how does he get injections? And why?
I had an elderly horse on Equioxx for several years. He lived to 27. And my current horse gets a course of Adequan 2x a year. He seems to do very well on it. Doing upper level dressage, although not for long periods of time and not every day.
The manufacturer’s dosing instructions are for 14 days only. Many people and vets are using different dosing protocols. So my vet clinic recommends letting it flush from the system at least monthly and running a kidney panel at least annually and before doing Osphos
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