Baby April Update

I took Baby April over the mountain last Tuesday to see the vet emeritus in Charlottesville.  The good news is she does not have a fracture.  When a horse is three-legged lame, it typically is something terrible like a fracture or an abcess.

We x-rayed the foot and blocked the heel. When we nerve blocked her heel she became mostly sound.  When the foot was blocked she was still lame which means the lameness is in her heel.  The abcess was very deep indeed.  My instructions were to soak her foot twice a day in warm epsom salts and then use a poultice around her coronet band at night, with warm water and epsom salts.

Well, Baby April will have none of the soaking. She is indeed a thrasher and at over 17 hands, she gets her way some of the time.  She even got in the face once so the soaking part, well, let's just say it is too dangerous for this middle-aged petite female.  That is not what the doctor ordered.


My barn looks like a hospital ward with all the duct tape, vet wrap, lotions, heat tape, potions, scissors and epsom salts.  I decided to turn April out.  She is not three-legged anymore, sound a at walk, not as sound at a trot but maybe the moving around will push this infection up and out since not much else has been going our way since mid-January.  The vet said also that this may never "pop" and we may just have to wait for the abcess to self-absorb into the foot.  I was hoping for a quicker recovery not the abcess from hell that I currently have.  Now I know that I would not be a good nurse. Patience is not one of my virtures.