There's Hope Yet

Yesterday was our much awaited follow up visit to Manor Equine for Roze and I took Ty along for a second opinion.

This was Roze's first vet follow up since her surgery in March. She has been feeling well and misbehaving in the pasture so I was confident she was doing well. The vet began by flexing her hocks, surprisingly she trotted off sound on her right hind, which is something she's never done in her life. The vet was also very surprised that she was doing so well. We then took a few x-rays just to see what was going on. Her hock is fusing very nicely. As a precaution to help with any inflammation left we injected her hocks to help finalize the healing process. The vet is going to consult with her surgeon at Purdue, but he feels it would be good for her to start work in a week or two when she's recovered from her hock injections.

I also took Ty along to get a second opinion as my local vet had diagnosed him with a hairline fracture in his front right pastern, which is club foot. When he was flexed he trotted off better then he had a month ago so at least he had recovered some since going on stall rest. The vet reviewed the x-rays from my local vet and also took a couple more of his own and found that Ty had been misdiagnosed, he has no fracture of any kind. He suspected an issue with his tendons or ligaments which we confirmed with an ultra sound. Ty has a tear in his annular ligament. A side affect in some ways from his club foot. We suspect that at some point he must have over flexed his foot and aggravated this tear. We injected Ty's joint/ligament and the vet recommended he resume normal activity in about a week. I also discussed at length his opinion of Ty's future soundness and he indicated he was very optimistic.

Needless to say I'm very relieved, although a bit frustrated with a misdiagnosis on Ty. Hopefully in a week or two both of my guys will be back under saddle. I may try to take Ty to one more show this fall. We'll see how quickly he comes back around but I am hopeful that we'll get one more in and Ty will continue to progress and excel in the dressage ring.