another question on stifle lock

[mistyroad]

I know questions on stifle lock have been asked before but my question is has anyone ever used injections of estrone and if so what were your results. Also my vet has my horse on bute paste for his weight with gastro gard. I know that bute is a no no for minis but I can not convince her of this and really I just don't know which way to go. Surgery is a option but the horse is just a yearling. I am not asking for advice but more what your experence with any of this has been. I just don't want any one to get in to trouble for practicing medicine. Any and all advice would be welcome.

Thank you

 

[wildoak]

In my experience - I have not had a problem using bute very sparingly on minis. It has been helpful with things like founder, tendon injuries, etc. and I think using Gastroguard with it is probably a good idea. Don't have any experience with estrone, would like to hear more about it. I had surgery done on a yearling filly this summer, they nicked the ligaments instead of cutting them. Much less down time & recovery with much the same results, so the vet says. She responded quite well at first, then started locking up a little again so I moved her out to a big pasture with lots of hills. So far so good. We went ahead with surgery on her as a yearling because she had problems consistently from the time she was about 6 months old.

Jan

 

[pictureperfect]

I know questions on stifle lock have been asked before but my question is has anyone ever used injections of estrone and if so what were your results. Also my vet has my horse on bute paste for his weight with gastro gard. I know that bute is a no no for minis but I can not convince her of this and really I just don't know which way to go. Surgery is a option but the horse is just a yearling. I am not asking for advice but more what your experence with any of this has been. I just don't want any one to get in to trouble for practicing medicine. Any and all advice would be welcome.                                      Thank you

474111[/snapback]

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I have a mare that had and still has stifle lock but it is no longer as bad. She is now 4 years old and the vet told me not to put her on bute unless she was in pain. Since she does not apear to be in pain and unlocks easily now and only locks up about once every couple months I have not used it. However, when she was bad I was told that estrone has been benificial in some cases. I did not get to try it because the vet didn't think her symtoms where bad enough. So basicaly I have found that some vets want to push surgery others want to expierment and then there are those that just want to leave it alone and see what happens. But I don't know that I would do anything untill they are at least a year old.

 

[willowoodstables]

Injections of esterone will not really help. THe esterone can help build muscle more over the hips of the horse, versus along the stifle (patella-ACL muscle). It will help develop the upper hip, not the lower where most stifle problems occur. Have your vet xray for chips. If nothing is torn (ACL or bone chips) you can inject the joint and it will tighten internally the ACL. BUT and please keep this in mind..nothing works permanently!!! If the horse takes a bad step and slips, they can re-tear or injure the stifle. I've had the stifles injected on one horse and he had to be done every year (dangers include infection ect) so he went to a pasture pal. THe other horse I only had done once and he has actually "dry" in his hock joint..never did him again. Only under extremely hopefully cases will I inject joints, I prefer to use methods of strengthening to help problems.

Edit here:

AND age can have a factor..give the colts time to grow. As for pain meds, my vet actually told me to let him be a little sore, the horse was less inclined to rip and snort during the healing process and that the inflammation (along with continued EASY straight line work) would help strengthen. He wanted the horse literally sore in BOTH stifles versus the just the bad one, so when he injected and horse went back to walking miles in straight lines he would keep even steps with two sore legs versus just the left or right. Unless the horse is shocky or can't put any weight on a leg, I will cold/hot hose and leave alone. There is a reason when we hurt ourselves we tend to take it easy and favour

Kim