Anyone had a mini w/Wobbles?

[Angel Creek]

Has anyone out there ever had a mini with Wobbles? We are certain.both myself and my vet, that our 10 month old colt we "rescued" with his dam from a dealer has Wobbles. Dam is fine but his hind end shows the classic signs of Wobblers and is progressivley worsening with age and more weight. If so, how did you treat it? Medical anti-imflammatories, diet changes or has anyone ever had the surgery done on a mini? We are unsure what to do, he doesn't seem to be in pain, just extremely oncoordinated at the moment. His walk shows the signs, his trot is OK, he can't canter, he bunny hops like typical Wobblers horses do. Gallop is out of the question all together. I wasn't planning on keeping him but we can't place him like this either so he is a lifer here now. He is getting gelded in april. I would be very interested to hear from anyone having seen or had a mini with Wobbles and what you did for the animal. We just want him to have a healthy happy life as best he can and be pain free.

 

[BeckyG]

I have not had a horse with Wobbles.

I am sure given your Vet's involvement the diagnosis would be correct.

But I was just wondering........ did your Vet rule-out Equine Protozoal Myeloencephalitis (EPM)?

It is a disease of the Central Nervous System, and can have similar symptoms.

We did have a mare with EPM and there is treatment.

We treated her with a daily dose of EPM paste for 3 months...... and she has recovered.

EPM is probably not even relevant.... but just wanted to mention, since symptoms can be similar.

Good Luck with your little guy.

Sounds like he is lucky he found you.

 

[nbark]

We had a QH with wobbles who lived a nice long "yard art" life. He was only a danger if he was ridden. The coordination thing does not change and surgery for wobbles is news to me. Wobbles in the big guys is a disc problem in the spine, if I remember correctly, going back some years here.

Just wanted to give you what I know, which I guess isn't much help, but they do adjust to their disability. The test the vet gave my horse was blind folding him and asking him to walk, they walk like German soldiers kicking their legs straight out.

 

[Angel Creek]

We had a QH with wobbles who lived a nice long "yard art" life. He was only a danger if he was ridden. The coordination thing does not change and surgery for wobbles is news to me. Wobbles in the big guys is a disc problem in the spine, if I remember correctly, going back some years here.
Just wanted to give you what I know, which I guess isn't much help, but they do adjust to their disability. The test the vet gave my horse was blind folding him and asking him to walk, they walk like German soldiers kicking their legs straight out.

Yes, EPM was ruled out, although we have not done any spinal fluid testing or mylogram or radiographs. My vet is certain it is Wobbles without doing extensive and quite expensive testing. If he gets a lot worse or shows signs of pain I will pursue it further, just want him to be comfortable. He is only going to be a companion at this point to our other lasy gelding, backyard pet! The surgery involved is not a 100% guaranteed fix and is VERY costly. It is when they actually fuse the spine together with titanium plates. Seattle Slew had it done, believe or not at age 26! So he could breed in his 27th year. Why, I wonder as from what I seen Wobbles can also be hereditary, although nothing has been proven on that either. So far we are just keeping him in when the footing is bad, especially on all this ice. He wants to romp and play with the other foals and does not seem to be in any pain at all, just a very uncoordinated boy. We keep his protein low so he doesn't grow too fast, and I am going to start him on some sort of supplements soon, anit inflammatories or such.

In april when he gets gelded, we are going to have a more complete neurological evaluation done. But so far he seems OK to just hang out. I have heard of Wobbles but in my 16 years of raising minis, I have never heard of it in a mini.

 

[uwharrie]

Not sure about how effective it would be in horses but in dogs with Wobblers there has been some great success with gold bead implants.

 

[Charlotte]

You mention the 'bunny hop' gait when trying to gallop. That is also characteristic with lateral luxation of the patella which may also worsen as the foal grows and matures. Bilateral.

I imagine your vet has ruled that one out.

Charlotte

 

[wildoak]

I had a young QH gelding diagnosed as a wobbler many years ago. Took him to A&M where they went over him with a fine tooth comb and ultimately decided he was just "not very athletic", a nice way of saying he was clumsy! He stumbled a lot with me but ultimately grew out of most of it and was sold.

Why, I wonder as from what I seen Wobbles can also be hereditary, although nothing has been proven on that either.

I think - and it's been awhile since I dealt with it - that it is Wobbler Syndrome, meaning it refers to a set of symptoms rather than a specific cause. Injury to the spinal cord, a specific parasite that attacks the spinal cord....several possible causes but I'd not heard of it being hereditary unless it was perhaps a particular conformational weakness that made it more likely. When my gelding was diagnosed, it was kind of the "disease of the year" LOL, a fairly recent thing and probably lots of misdiagnoses at the time.

Good luck with your colt - hope he is stable enough to have a good life and not be a danger to himself.

Jan

 

[lil hoofbeats]

Im pretty sure with this disease that it is basically an elimination of everything else it could be. You could see the stenosis on an MRI, but who has that kind of money!!

A few years back there was a lady of means that sent one of her walking horses that had developed this disease(you will see it develope as the horse ages and, much faster if the horse has weight put on it, such as being ridden), she sent it to a vet at the University of California, and Wobbels was the diagnosis. The vet called her and told her to put the animal down. She told him, "Anyone can put an animal down, i sent my horse there for you to do something to stop the disease from getting worse". That vet stopped the progression of the disease by only feeding the animal enough to keep it alive, not enough for it to "grow". This stopped the disease from progressing(did not eliminate it, or cure it), by not allowing the animal enough feed to grow, but only to survive. Thus stopping the progression of the disease.

Cruel? maybe, but that animal is alive right now,and many others diagnosed with this disease are dead. That is the only way to stop it from progressing. the damage that is there now will be there. Anti inflammatories will not help the stenosis in the spine. You must stop the spine from growing to prevent the symptoms from worsening.

By the way, yes it is hereditary, and i have seen mild forms in Miniatures. Both of them out of the same stallion out of 2 different mares.

 

[rabbitsfizz]

I had an Arab filly with Wobbler Syndrome, oh, about thirty years ago.

We had her euthanised....sorry.

I think it depends on how serious it is, but it is progressive as the vertebrae disintegrate.

I think this being a Mini you have a better prognosis, as I have had three Dobes with this now and they all lived normal lives and their deaths were not affected, much, by the disease.

The bitch I had euthanised just before Christmas had almost lost control of her rear end by then, but was also 13 years old, which is a very good age for aDobe.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wobbler_disease

 

[nbark]

From what I have learned recently Wobbles was usually found in really muscled horses like QH and TB. There is surgery, was only done by two doctors, one in Texas and VERY expensive. It is also a very delicate surgery. Usually this was done on horses that were big money horses, like Seattle Slew" and whose owners had money trees growing on the property next to the barn. Just a little more info I thought you might like to have.

 

[jleonard]

I had one, a very unusual case, several years ago. The horse was 17 when it hit overnight. One day he was fine, the next he had lost all coordination in his hindend. We tested him for everything, did a spinal tap and treated for EPM even though every test was negative. We finally had to euthanize him. We had tried everything possible, including taking him to a world renowned specialist (the one who treated Seattle Slew). Neither vet ever expected EDM (wobbles) because of his age. He was a great vet, and felt so bad that he had not been able to diagnose the horse that he paid for the necropsy. He told us that necropsy was the only way to positively diagnose it. In this case, they found the lesions and our understanding was that a calcification of the spine hit the brain stem, which I gues accounts for the sudden severe onset. Had that not happened, it may have been much longer before he began exhibiting symptoms. I did not realize until recently that it was wobbles, the necropsy report said Equine Degenerative Myloencephalopathy and I didn't know they were the same thing. You may want to do a search on EDM, there is some info out there, though not a whole lot. One cause it gave was a vitamin E defficiency, I cannot remember all of the others. We were told that there was nothing that could have been done for my horse. I suppose a mini would not be as dangerous to be around, and your's does not sound to be nearly as bad at this point as mine was. It would be great if there were a way to slow the progression. I looked at a wobbler over the summer w/ the vet I ride with, his suggestion was euthanization (again, a big horse). Next thing we heard, the people had sold him as a jumper

. That same vet has mentioned before that some people will turn the horse out for a year and see what happens, I guess some can grow out of the symptoms? I hope that you are able to find way to save him, it is a terrible disease

 

[Oakbrooke Farm]

We just put down (day after Christmas) our little boy who had Wobblers Disease. Email me directly if you have any questions. [email protected]