A stressful week!

Last week I was off work, I had lots of things planned as I wasn't going away, some horsey, some not.  As is often the case with horses, everything went awry!  It ended up being a very stressful and hard week because Chesney was not well :(

On Sunday, when I got the horses in from the field, Chesney had a nail in his frog, not a nail from a shoe, a proper nail.  I have NO idea where it came from and am horrified that he must have picked it up in the field.  

I don't know why, I should know better, but I pulled the nail out.  To be honest I didn't think it was in very deep as it seemed to be lying along the side of his frog, but it was bent and half the nail was in his frog at an angle.  It bled A LOT, in fact an unbelievable amount :(

I called the vet out and he arrived pretty quickly.  Chesney was a bit lame, he was walking on it a bit carefully and when standing rested it a bit but he wasn't too bad.  As requested by the vet, while I was waiting I tried to put Chesney's foot in a bowl of saltwater.  However, it obviously did hurt because he absolutely refused to put his foot in the bowl - which is unusual for him.

The vet had a good look when he arrived, Chesney had to be sedated because he would  not keep his foot still and kept snatching it away.  We discussed where the nail had been and after a good scrub with hibiscrub the vet pared a bit of frog away to have a better look.  It is always difficult to decide how deep the wound is and that was the issue - had the nail penetrated into the tendon sheath or the synovial fluid around the pedal bone or just gone into the frog?

The vet used some tweezers to see how deep the wound had gone and it seemed as though it may not have gone past the frog.  He poulticed it and bandaged it up to keep it clean.  Antibiotics are not always useful with feet, so Chesney didn't have any that night and, so that I could really see how much it hurt he also did not have any painkillers.

When I arrived on Monday I could see that Chesney was really not well.  He didn't want to move and looked really depressed, it was obviously hurting a lot.  The vet came back out and after looking at him gave him a shot of painkillers.  He quite quickly seemed to feel a bit better. 

Then followed a horrible conversation.  Chesney could have x-rays and lots of other tests to see where the nail had gone into.  If the nail had gone into his foot then he would be likely to need an operation - Chesney is 23 years old, he cannot be separated from Basil for long because he becomes very upset.  So sending him away for an operation to then be followed by a long period of box rest is not an option.

The vet did conduct a nerve block test to see if the pain was only in his foot  and the infection had not gone up the tendon sheath into his leg.  This established the pain was only in the foot (at the moment).  It was decided to try pumping Chesney full of antibiotics for 24 hours and see how he was.  He had an injection of antibiotics (not Penicillin as Chesney is allergic) and of painkillers.

There followed the most stressful 36 hours I can remember for a long time.  

On Monday evening it was planned that I would give him a sachet of Danilon (similar to Bute ) but his leg had swelled up, this could have been as the infection was travelling up his leg OR just swelling from limited movement.  He was also in more pain again so I called the vet.  I didn't give Chesney his Danilon but the vet gave him another injection of painkiller and we bandaged his leg.  I just had to see how he was in the morning.

As you can imagine arriving at the stables on Tuesday morning was awful and I was terrified that Chesney was going to be worse again, but he seemed quite a bit better.  The painkillers would only have lasted 6-8 hours so it wasn't that :)  He was putting more weight on the foot, walking around and seemed much happier.  The vet was due at 9.30am and when he arrived he was pleased too.  It didn't mean that Chesney was definitely going to recover but it seemed more positive.  His foot was poulticed again and he had more antibiotics and painkillers.

On Tuesday evening Chesney was just the same, he had a sachet of Danilon.  On Wednesday morning he seemed a bit sore but was still putting weight on the foot, walking around and bright enough. The vet came back again on Wednesday and checked progress.  Chesney had another antibiotic injection and when the vet left he had a second breakfast with another Danilon!

On Thursday he was much the same, a bit better again if anything, he was to continue to have a Danilon morning and night.   I had to give Chesney his antibiotics by syringing them into his mouth ... this proved impossible ... more than half ended up either on the floor or all over me.  By Friday morning, after the third attempt at giving Chesney the antibiotics I rang the vet and said it wasn't working.  Chesney was prescribed some different antibiotics in powder form which he could have in his food.  This has not proved to be much more successful as Chesney is not keen to eat them.  On Friday evening I left his food for him to eat overnight - which he did.  On Saturday morning it took 45 minutes for him to eat his food and that night I left it with him again.  

Sunday morning (yesterday) after an hour of waiting I had to give up because he wasn't eating it.  (I have been giving him a separate small bowl of Hi-Fi at lunchtime so that he does eat his Prascend tablets for his Cushings.)  However, he still seems to be improving and is walking totally normally now and does not seem to be in any pain.  He is having a new dry poultice every day and there is a small amount of discharge from the wound but it is not smelly.  Once this stops he can have an antibiotic spray on the wound instead - hopefully it will then close up quite quickly.

Basil and Chesney have obviously been in all week, pottering on the yard to keep his wound clean and dry. Poor Basil has been an angel really to keep Chesney company.  Tommy has been able to go out as usual, he was a bit confused at the beginning of the week but has got used to it now.

So the week ended much better than it started but this holiday week is definitely my worst ever.

Did you see last week's video 'Mats and stuff ...' on my You Tube channel?   
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Until next time!

Jo