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 Post subject: navicular cyst
PostPosted: Wed Jul 01, 2015 10:14 am 
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Joined: Wed May 27, 2015 10:20 am
Posts: 515
Slulver posted:

Quote:
I have a tb g. w/ one lg. navicular cyst, no other changes, just this big cyst. He is not lame or off + I'd like to keep it that way. Can anything be done for this?



My reply:

Mmmmmmmm, navicular cyst? Back in my day, we did not have such a specialized diagnosis of the navicular. If the animal didn't show lameness, it was often missed. I raced one old horse many years ago in the Philadelphia area who had chronic navicularitis. He was a game old race horse. When he first hit the track, he would be very ouchy and the state track vet would be zeroing in on him and rightly so. But after scoring down a few times, warming up--the minute he turned for the starting gate, he smoothed right out and often did very well at the finish line. Oh, I might add, he was a standardbred pacer which I am sure made a difference in prolonging his soundness due to the mechanics of his race gait, the pace. In contrast, a thoroughbred that races at a running gait could probably not sustain the pressures on a navicular as well as the two beat gait of the racing pacing gait. Guess, the moral to the story is if you take care of your horse and limit the stresses involved, he can have a long useful life.

The first thing is to keep him comfortably shod. You want him with as short a toe as possible, but with a normal angle in front, approximately 50 degrees. You will see recommendations from vets and other people of raising that angle--DON'T DO IT. By keeping him trimmed with a nice short toe, you are in effect rising the angle via break-over ease, without actually doing it physically. You might also put a half-round shoe on him in front to increase break-over or if you want to get really fancy (though more expensive), put a half-round bar shoe on in front. A bar shoe will give some protection/support to the navicular area.

As a race horse trainer, I never neglected the hooves. I would pack them after each work day with bentonite mud to keep them moist and paint the outside of the hoof and coronary band with used motor oil to limit evaporation. I did this religiously. So don't neglect the shoeing and the hoof maintance on a daily basis.

Also, protect your horse from hard surfaces and movement on those surfaces. Speed kills, thus, protect him from high speeds, quick turns, all unnatural stresses.

I would not go into any other special treatments until your horse actually exhibits lameness. There are herbs out there that will aid in bone/cartilage healing.

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