Adequan or cortisone shot…which would you choose?
Hi,
first off let me say the horse is under vet care and basically the vet said it was my call which joint "medicine" to use.
the horse came sound, to me at 4 yrs old. that was 2 years ago.
his left hind stifle quickly became a big soundness issue.AFTER about 3 months off the track. once his body started to let down (i was riding him but it is not the same as race training) all the nasty little lameness started to show them selves. i dont know what drugs/anti inflamatory’s/ or medicines they had him on.
he was recovering from surgery to have knee chips removed from racing. it was 3months into his training to get back to racing when they finally threw in the towel and called me.
in any event he is a wonderful horse, and i have been working with a vet and acupuncturist to get him sound.
which would you recommend for this fella?
he is prone to all over body soreness, so i am leaning toward the adequan…but am not sure if it would fully address the stifle issue.
before going the route of injections i decided to try an herbal supplement.
got it from england…called "after ace".
it has devils claw in it which is a mild anti inflmatory. it also had some other herbs for tieing up syndrome which can be created by messed up joints and the horse compensating with other parts of his body.
by day 10 the horse was completely "freed up" is the only way i can describe it.
the down side to this product is that it is about 80 per month…plus you have to dose them in the mouth …because mixing it in food breaks it down and it doesnt do anything.
but it did work which tells me the horse can become more sound long term if i pick the right product.
sounds like the cortisone shot is NOT the way to go…and thank u so much for your answers so far!
The following reply is by : Ponygirl :
Cortisone is only a short term treatment. It is the best anti inflammatory out there, hands down. BUT it completely stops all remodeling of cartilage. A single cortisone shot was put in 5 horses knees, and after a year, a horse was sacrificed, and it was noted that the cartilage was in stasis. So each year for the next 4 years, a horse was sacrificed, and the single cortisone shot had shut down the cartilage such that at the cellular level, no cartilage had been made in 5 years. Vets were very surprised at this, and they do not know how long the process will be shut down since they ran out of horses.
In any case, a horse does a lot of moving around on his legs during that time.
Adequan, or even better, Legend is the same chemical makeup of the synovial fluid within the joints, and puts the joints and cartilage in a position to repair itself.
Adequan will take longer to work; about 3 months, and that is 5-6 shots, so quite costly, but there are no downsides except your wallet. Cortisone will give you short term success, is very cheap, but will shut down his repair and rebuilding system.
Go for the Adequan. Ask your vet about Legend; it is a second generation medication that has some advantages over Adequan, and when given with Rubella Vac or Ketophen, works very, very well body wide to help the horse heal.
Depending on what’s going on with the stifle, sometimes, you can have the vet inject Iodine into the lateral collateral ligament of the stifle to tighten it up. It works very well for some horses.