Corneal Ulcer

[Loess Hills]

We've been treating our little yearling filly, Cloud, for an eye infection for about a week. Our vet made a trip out last week to look at her because of an irritated eye. Treatment was an antibiotic ointment 3 times a day, banamine, and an eyedrop twice a day which dilated the eye. Well, she improved some, but after five days was still tearing constantly, and had begun to develop pus in the corner of the eye.

Today we hauled her to the vet again, and he was quite concerned. Apparently in about 90% of cases the irritation heals in a few days, but 10% of the time they don't. Vet is going to operate tomorrow to graft a piece of tissue into the corneal defect. The operation is to seal the corneal ulcer with a healthy piece of ocular tissue. So any prayers and positive thoughts would really be appreciated!

Poor little thing is in a huge stall missing her buddies, and her beautiful eye is almost shut with matter, tearing, and the ulcer in the lower part of the eye.

Has anyone ever had any experience with this problem? And what was the outcome?

 

[Mona]

Oh no, that poor little girl. Best of luck with the procedure.

 

[Kim]

I'm sorry that my experience with this was not more positive...

I have a horse that had an ulcer that didn't heal - it turned into a melting ulcer, and one thing we tried was the tissue graft onto the cornea. Unfortunately in his case, the eye was infected with a strange fungus that he picked up at Nationals, and despite my vets' best efforts, as well as those at the University we hauled him to, the eye ended up having to be removed. The infection was not clearing up, and because of that and a few other complicating factors (including a reaction to a blood transfusion and jaundice - poor guy!) the decision was made to remove the eye before the infection spread into the brain. The good news is, though, that once the eye was removed he returned to good health quickly, and now he is just fine with only one eye and doesn't seem to miss it at all.

An important thing to remember with corneal ulcers is to be very aggressive with the medication - at one point with another horse I had with a corneal ulcer (not the same one - this horse's eye ended up being just fine), we were administering topical antibiotics every 15 minutes around the clock.

I do hope that your filly's eye turns out just fine. If the worst happens, though, and the eye has to be removed, do keep in mind that most horses with only one eye function just fine. Unless she's destined to be a show horse, it shouldn't really affect the rest of her life much at all.

 

[Reijel's Mom]

Not sure that this is helpful, but my old riding mare strangely gets a corneal ulcer about 1-2 times a year, always in the same eye, and it's always stubborn - usually lasting about 2 weeks. So I keep vetropolycin on hand to treat it. This last time, I treated for a few days, didn't see improvement, called the vet out (because I'd also been told it should resolve within a week), she just recommended to give bute for a few more days (again we are talking big horse) and keep up with the vetropolycin. A week later I called the vet out AGAIN because I wasn't seeing improvement, she couldn't come until the next day, of course by the next day my mare was on the mend finally!

So, this was a case where the problem went on for a couple of weeks and the horse ended up healing ok on her own.

But I'm glad you are getting yours fixed up by the vet, it's obviously a really painful thing for them.

 

[MeadowRidge Farm]

I have positive experience with one that the ulcer behind the eye actually popped the eye out of the socket. My vet wanted to just remove the eye, but I said no to that..we found a vet about 5 days later, (in the week in between I was treating her very aggressively with antibiotics, and banamine) that is a specialist in the equine field. He preformed surgery on Beauty, and saved her eye and sight. Other then for a little dot in the middle of her eye you would never know it. She was in the equine hospital for 4 days and then in her stall being treated by us for 2 weeks...that was 5 yrs ago and she has had no problems with that eye since. Corinne

 

[Sunny]

My heart goes out to you and your filly. I do hope she heals well. My experience with this is very similar to what Kim described above, unfortunately.

Two years ago, I had a gorgeous little colt born. At two weeks of age, he injured his left eye, maybe a kick or something like that. It didn't look like much at the time. By the next morning, it had developed an ulcer and I called the vet immediately. He cleaned it up, treated it, gave him some banamine, and left me antibiotic ointment to apply three times a day. A couple of days later, there was no significant improvement, and in fact was starting to look worse. The vet checked it again and said it was now a melting corneal ulcer and if these eye drops didn't help, we would probably have to remove the eye. Sadly, that's exactly what happened and, at three weeks of age, he had the surgery. It just broke my heart, but he was the perfect little patient and everyone at the university just loved him. It all healed up well and I think he's the only one who doesn't "know" that he has only one eye, which happens to be blue. He lost his brown one.

I truly hope this doesn't happen to your Cloud but, if it does, rest assured that she will adjust well and live a perfectly normal life. I'll keep her in my thoughts and prayers, and will look for an update from you. Best wishes.

 

[RobinRTrueJoy]

I had a good quarter horse that had a bad corneal ulcer. Antibiotic ointmnet every 2 hours times24 hours then every four hours X a week then every 6 hours X a week, we also did the atropine eye drops to keep the pupil dilated I think it was every 6 hours. It wasn't for about a week that they added the steroid/antibiotic drops. MUST take care of infection prior to adding the steroids otherwise the infection will get worse. Keep the horse in during daylight hours, as the atropine dilates the eye and sunlight hurts.

If its really bad, a special catheter can be place through the skin and I think under the lid so that anyibiotics can be infused through it.

It took a while, and meticulous care but it turned out ok. I slept at the barn the first 2 days. He ended up with a small scar.

 

[Charlotte]

Oh no Rose...or Aaron (not sure who was writing) I'm so sorry little Cloud is having problems. I know Viki, TC mini Family Farms, had a yearling filly with an operation of that type. Her condition sounded worse than Cloud's as the cornea was already perforated I think. She healed beautifully and I could never tell where the injury was. This was last year.

I'll keep little Cloud, and her 'family' in my prayers.

Charlotte

 

[Viki]

Charlotte is correct. I had a filly with a BAD ulcer! It actually made a hole in her eye! I had been treating it with antibiotics and ointment, per my vet. When the hole showed up, he sent me to a surgery center. I was sure they would remove the eye. But no! At this point, I did have all infection cleared up. They did surgery on her and actually saved her sight! They closed the hole and grafted over it to protect it while it healed. She had to stay in hospital for a few days, then stalled during the day at home for a couple MONTHS. All she has left of the ordeal is a TINY little scar that goes unnoticed by most people. Her vision is just fine! I hope your outcome is as good! It does take MONTHS of treatment. The good thing is, once they graft it, no more drops or ointment! The surgeon didn't want ANYTHING put into her eye. She did have some yellow puss appear about 1.5 weeks after surgery. He gave me oral meds to clear it up and it was just improvement after that!

Good luck and don't give up yet!

Viki

 

[honeycomb max]

I too have had a little colt that we had to remove the eye. Tramp is now two, a gelding, and a pet here forever. Tramp does not know that he has only one eye. He is a great guy that loves life.

Hope everything works out for your little one.

Millie

 

[Loess Hills]

Wednesday 3/7: Update on our filly with the eye problem: Talked with the vet this afternoon following the procedure, and everything went fine. They will keep her a couple of days for treatment and followup and then she'll be coming home! :aktion033:

: :aktion033:

Thank you, everyone for your throughts and sharing your experiences. My husband and I are both feeling responsible. We should have notified the vet that the eye drops and ointment weren't showing that much improvement. In between two days of blizzard last week and snow removal, we've been keeping them in the barn, but we should have been more alert to what was going on. Foolishly, we realize now, we were just hoping that the treatment would cure the problem instead of being more agressive when it didn't.

Sometimes we wonder if we'll ever live long enough to find out all the problems horses can have! Really do appreciate all the information available here, thanks again.

 

[Field-of-Dreams]

AWESOME!! :aktion033: Great news!!

Just remember, folks, NEVER use an antibiotic in an eye that contains steriods (cortizone) if there may be ANY chance that the surface is scratched, unless prescribed by your Vet. Cortizone will cause a melting ulcer.... read this in EQUUS years ago, I've never forgotten it.

Lucy

 

[TMR]

Glad to hear Cloud is doing well, hopefully all will go well now. Do not blame yourself . Even if you had called the vet, I don't know if he could have done much in that blizzard most places were completely shut down and snowed under. You know most roads in Sioux City were unusable so it would have been tough for him to do anything different. Eye problems are tough to deal with and it is tough to telll in the initial stages if it is getting better or not as they tend to keep the eye closed and tear alot. I will keep her and you in our prayers and don't beat yourself up over it.

:

 

[Loess Hills]

Hey, thank you, Donna! Good to hear from you. Hope all is well at your place. Doesn't this winter just _uck? :no: :ugh:

 

[The Simple Life Farm]

Glad to hear your horse is doing better.

I work for HUMAN ophthalmologists, and I can tell you that having a corneal ulcer is very painful and very serious. As others have stated, if it does heal, more than likely it will leave a scar. Having a corneal scar will limit vision some or give a permenant blurred spot in the vision. The dilating drops are given to help the muscles relax and relieve pain, but does make the eye very light sensative.

Do not feel quilty about your horse. I am sure the symptoms led you to believe that it was an infection.

FYI... you do have to be very careful when administering any type of steroid, it can actually cause the situation to become worse or give a whole new set od problems.

Hopefully the graft transplant will be sucessful. Please keep us updated.

Kelly

 

[Filipowicz Farm]

Hope all turns out well for your horse.

 

[StarRidgeAcres]

To continuing improvement

:

 

[wendi leigh]

My mare had a corneal ulcer that my regular vet treated for about two weeks with two or three different drops. When it wasn't healed completely by then, I took her to a vet opthomologist for a second opinion. The eye doctor gave us an entirely different regime of drops, and within two or three days, the eye cleared up beautifully and stopped tearing. When she went back for her recheck at 10 days, the eye doctor said she was very lucky. She could have easily lost the eye given the depth of the ulcer she had. Hope your little one makes a full recovery as well!!