Re: [RC] Old endurance horse lameness - Sandy Adams
All of this is VERY useful information for anyone dealing with an aged horse who is in such a condition. If I were in this position (which may come to me soon since we have two horses in their mid and late 20s), I would hope that last sentence would not be said. I don't know anyone who deliberately tortures their horse in this case; rather, most people who are in this position are indeed trying to care for their horse, and "save" him. All of the information is enough to indicate that "Saving" this horse means doing that act of compassion - the most compassionate thing to do - say goodbye. Knowing that we will again have this decision to make sometime in the not so distance future.... I would not want to hear that last. Compassion includes the human. I, too, would put this horse down, and would have a few friends or family there to help me say goodbye. Why? Because after all attempts to retrieve a quality of life for my horse proved less than useful - for my HORSE - I would also need the compassion, and I think anyone who has shared a bond with a horse over any number of years would also. So dear, yes, say goodbye to your friend, and let him go , knowing that while you won't really ever replace that partner, another partner will come along - perhaps of a spicier mindset or a more soul-searching character. Just wait. It will come. For now, you ARE saving your partner by saving him from pain. You have a lot of support from people you don't even know, who have been where you are now. Shoot, and will be again someday soon! Take care. We care!
S
On Nov 22, 2009, at 10:58 PM, k s swigart wrote:
Angie said after a long descritpoin of symptoms, attemps at diagnostics, and attempts at treatment;
Any advice is welcome.
If it were my horse, I would put him down.
Further treatment without a diagnosis is just shooting in the dark; further diagnostics are probably going to be very expensive and likely to lead to diagnosis of a condition that is either impossible or too expensive to treat.
That said:
If it IS cellulitis. My horse had that. She spent 4 days in the hospital on IV anti-biotics and then another two weeks on the oral anti-biotic chlorampheocol (sp?) which had to be adminstered 4 times a day at six hour intervals (total bill was over $3000 and the treatment was damned inconvenient during the "drug her 4 times a day" phase).
In addition to "sweating" it for it 2+ weeks. Have you tried that?
If the anti-biotic you are giving the horse is SMZ tablets (a pretty common broad based oral anti-biotic for horses), then a dose of 5 for a 1100 pound horse is WAY under dosing him. 12 is a more reasonable one.
But, for a 29 year old horse with bad arthritis going in to winter with an undiagnosed "three-legged lameness' problem, I would just take this as a sign that it was time to end it, and not wait for the horse to become so abjectly miserable that nobody would deny that it is the right thing to do. If, when deciding to put a horse down, you don't question whether you are doing it too soon...you are doing it too late (i.e. if it the horse is in so much pain that it is obvious, you waited too long).
If you ask me, waiting for abject misery before deciding that it is the right time to put a horse down is the equivalent of torturing a horse before you have the decency to kill it.
