Ben tries his nose at abstract art

Alternate title: Ulcer and saddle update

Ben will finish his 28d course of GastroGard today. His vet was coming out to chiro him on Friday and make sure he wasn't too out of whack from his trip into a jump, so we decided to combine the two and recheck his scope after he got adjusted. I gotta hand it to him, as usual he was the perfect patient. He hadn't eaten since 8 PM the night before and his buddies were all in munching on hay, but he was very compliant for his adjustment.

His adjustment went well. Way more out in his neck than usual, but not surprising. She said she was happy we sedated him right after, she feels like sometimes when there is a lot of muscle soreness the sedation lets the muscles relax and not immediately pull the vertebrae back. 

His back was unhappy too, but that is the fault of my dressage saddle. It was sent away at not insubstantial cost to get THE SAME panels as the jump saddle. But it came back not with those panels. Well, I thought, maybe they know what they're doing, but it is making him sore in the exact same spot as before. The fitter picked it up today and offered me a free saddle pad to make up for the inconvenience. No offer of refunding part of the cost of panels or shipping (to be clear, I am not paying for anything this time they are taking it). Definitely will be the last time I ever use Forestier, this has not been a great experience. I think if their saddles fit initially that would've been fine and great, but the experience of trying to get it to fit... not great AT ALL. And they DO NOT seem made for "typical" TB backs. I know every horse is different, but these saddles are WIDE with WIDE panels and a WIDE gullet channel, made for WIDE WBs IMO. 

To summarize: First I bought a dressage saddle and a jump saddle in May, and then pretty promptly paid to change the jump saddle panels. The rep then never rechecked after the saddle was returned from NJ. Second rep looks a few months later, agrees completely with me that the saddle DOES NOT FIT AT ALL and is making him sore. Ships it off for free and gets it right, YAY! I ride solely in the jump saddle for a month, we make sure it does not make him sore over time, and then I pay to ship off the dressage saddle to get the same panels. Lo and behold, it returns a month later without the same panels as the jump saddle, and here we are. Roughly eight months after buying two saddles from them, and I still do not have two saddles that fit him. They've also had three different reps since May when I first bought the saddles. I'm sure that has not helped. Any time we make changes, the saddles get shipped to NJ and are gone for 4-6 weeks which does not help my satisfaction levels, especially since I previously used wool saddles where adjustments were made on the farm the same day.

Anyways, small saddle rant aside, back to ulcers. To summarize our current protocol: 

Full tube of gastrogard 1x/day since scope. Trying my best to get it on an empty stomach, but not killing myself if that doesn't happen.

Lifestyle changes: 

• Out with whole herd during the day, since we came back from Rocking Horse. I figured he needed emotional health more than all his hair. Knock on wood, he's not getting chewed on so far.
• Alfalfa cubes mixed with his lunch daily. 

Supplement: KER Resolvin EQ

I did not do the KER ResolvinEQ  product justice when I described their research and the changes in Grade 1 or 2 horses. My initial interpretation was that there wasn't a change in the number of horses with grade 1 or 2 ulcers. While technically correct, the HORSES themselves changed grades, just not the total number of horses with grade 1 or 2. With one exception, the more severe horses (grade 3 or 4)  improved to grade 0, 1 or 2. The grade 1 or 2 horses resolved with the supplement. This chart from their paper does a better job showing what I'm trying to describe: 

Results: Ben is VASTLY improved. He still had one grade one, sitting conveniently right near a bot, potentially the causative agent for that one. So he got a tube of Quest Plus on Friday as well. The whole mucosa looked much healthier and there were fewer gobs of goo stuck to it. 

When his vet went to pull the tube he moved his head a tiny bit. Cue large nose bleed. 

And his abstract art on the stall wall, not even his stall, we'd swapped him to be closer to the electric and her truck

It had almost stopped and then he sneezed out this blood clot

She said if that was going to be the way she started her Friday, at least it was with another vet. Nose bleeds are annoying, but not life threatening (at least not when they come from gently bonking the ethmoids in an inconvenient spot with a tube on the way out), so I was more so amused at the range on his spray than concerned about the blood. She pretty quickly got the rag over his halter to minimize it, but even so he did a number on the wall. She hung out till it had completely stopped, and he was eating hay. Poor kid did make a few funny faces and spit out some hay because it was kinda bloody at first. But by 10 minutes later he was eating like a champ and super ready to go out with his friends. 

Going forward, we're going to do 1/4 tube of GG any day he travels. I'm messing with things that haven't been studied and I'm decreasing his ResolvinEQ to 30mL twice daily instead of the studied 60mL. It makes it much more palatable at $107 per month instead of $215. We're going to keep up the alfalfa cubes and if I remember it, we're going to pick up some Purina Outlast to use at shows or at other high stress times. 

Looking inside

Ben got scoped Monday. I'd been wanting to do it for a while. Then he almost bit me a few weeks ago doing a belly lift, very very out of character for him. We'd scheduled a recheck appointment for his mystery lameness for Monday. Thankfully though, he is sound and has been since Friday (and has stayed sound with under saddle work!!) So we switched his appointment from lameness  to a scope. 

Ben has a few ulcers, grade 2 equine squamous gastric disease (ESGD). Bad enough that we're starting a full 28 day course of Omeprazole. Ouch. Grade 2 is technically "mild", but looking at his stomach, ouch.

Then... Then... We enter the world of gastric supplements. Oh boy. One of those of there are so many things that claim to do this, none must work 100% of the time. I ended up ordering resolvinEQ from Kentucky Equine Research. It has long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids. They did a study with 13 thoroughbreds in training. This supplement decreased severe ulcer (grade 3-4) from 38% of horses to 8% of horses. Low n number and the overall prevalence of ulcers was 54% in unsupplemented horses and 31% in supplemented horses. So it may not do a whole lot for the "mild" grade 1-2. I put mild in quotes because his grade 2 stomach sure looked uncomfortable. I'll see if there are enough behavior changes to gauge our maintenance treatment success from that. If not, scoping on farm was incredibly reasonable, so I'll have his vet back out at some point. We're definitely going to recheck after the month of GG to make sure they resolved. 

Lifestyle wise, he'd probably be happier with a buddy all the time. He gets his friend at night but because the field they go in is small, he is without his friend during the day. In the summer when the grass is growing more quickly, we might be able to change that. He has forage nearly 100% of the time - grass with hay supplemented in the pasture and then hay for the 3-4 hours he spends in the stall to eat grain. After the biting, I did buy alfalfa cubes to soak and feed before trailering. The travel is definitely the most stressful part of his life. He likes the box stall set up better than straight load. I am not sure if he likes traveling with a friend better (ie in straight load) or solo in the box stall. He would travel less if he lived at JT's. And could probably have a friend to go out with who wouldn't beat him up. But he'd spend more time overall in the stall. 

I think for now I'll try the new supplement and alfalfa cubes daily as our maintenance. If that isn't effective, maybe a major lifestyle change to move to JTs barn to minimize his travel. Although he'd still haul out to school and show, sooooo.... 

I might try some Purina Outlast as well. Unclear how to combine that with my alfalfa cubes idea. Also unclear how to get the GG on an empty stomach. Maybe post ride? 

Oof. Anyone out there gone through this and want to share their fav gut support?