[TrueColoursFarm]

I came across a new term that I had never heard of before on this thread:

My mare that aborted a month ago has taken a turn for the worse. She had been checked about 10 days ago because she seemed to have some irritation when urinating and blood came back fine, ultrasound revealed no fluid, nothing seemed out of the ordinary. She was fine the day after the vet exam and didn't seem to be straining anymore and was urianting much better. She was eating really well and looking much, much better since her abortion (caused by hydrops). Yesterday at am feeding I found her in a post-colic state (dried sweat) and diarrhea all over the walls. Vet gave her fluids as she was slightly dehydrated and found this time that she had an uterine infection and had slight pooling of fluid, but blood still was within normal. Mare is not eating at all, althoough she had been drinking well until this morning. She has never had any type of fever at anytime. She's on trimetoprim (or whatever the injectable TMS is). She has spent the entire day on IV fluids. She's eaten a few mouthfuls of hay, and her first bowel movemnt since yesterday came out like diarrhea again (insert few choice words). My vet is stumped as are we. Anybody have any ideas what might be wrong? Her gums still aren't a great color (much darker than normal) and the mare isn't doing well at all.

and:


When my mare aborted due to hydrops, we had to watch her very carefully for about 3 months. It was walking a tightrope every day with her feeding program.

and:

I had a mare "crash" following an abortion and we could never determine the cause.

and:

Posteddocument.write(''+ myTimeZone('Sat, 17 Dec 2005 17:31:29 GMT-0800', 'Dec. 17, 2005 08:31 PM')+''); Dec. 17, 2005 08:31 PM Dec. 17, 2005 08:31 PMTrimethoprim-sulpha is generally contraindicated in horses with diarrhea, as it can actually make it worse and cause colitis, which can be very, very bad. Maybe ask your vet about switching antibiotics, although I'm sure they have a good reason for using the TMS.

and:

Posteddocument.write(''+ myTimeZone('Sat, 17 Dec 2005 19:22:10 GMT-0800', 'Dec. 17, 2005 10:22 PM')+''); Dec. 17, 2005 10:22 PM Dec. 17, 2005 10:22 PMI've never had to deal with this before but i'm wondering why your vet isn't doing frequent uterine flushes with antibiotics and culturing to make sure he has all the gunk out of there. The reddened gums sound like a sepsis is at work. Has your vet taken any uterine cultures to make sure some type of bacteria isn't growing in there - if there is bacteria a culture might help identify the best antibiotic she should be on.
I'll keep my fingers crossed!!

and:

Posteddocument.write(''+ myTimeZone('Sat, 17 Dec 2005 20:37:54 GMT-0800', 'Dec. 17, 2005 11:37 PM')+''); Dec. 17, 2005 11:37 PM Dec. 17, 2005 11:37 PMHillside: when I was trying to research possible correlations between the diarrhea and abortion, I did read that generally any antibiotic is contraindicated in diarrhea cases but more-so with any oral antibiotics. We're giving her the TMS intraveinously; I really hope this isn't going to aggravate her more but I'm going on what the vet says so I hope she's right!

ThreeDays: she did flush her yesterday...but this is a first for me too so maybe I should ask about flushing again? I think she doesn't want to irritate the uterus too much more. Anyone experienced with flushing procedures?

We just gave her another 2 bottle of fluid and Puz has eaten some of her hay. She looks a little more alert and interested in her surroundings, but everytime I *think* she's starting to pick up, she goes the opposite direction. This has been a long 2 days.

and:

Posteddocument.write(''+ myTimeZone('Sun, 18 Dec 2005 05:12:50 GMT-0800', 'Dec. 18, 2005 08:12 AM')+''); Dec. 18, 2005 08:12 AM Dec. 18, 2005 08:12 AMFlushing,if done correctly, can be done several days in a row. By correctly, I mean as stirile as possible.
Usually when a mare retains a piece of the placenta, that is what most repro vets do.
Was your mare flushed with antibiotics right after the hydrops abortion? Did your vet check to see if there were any "tags" of placenta left behind?(tags can cause severe infections, either within days or even weeks later[especially if antibiotics were given right after the abortion-it could have masked symptoms]) These are relatvly common oversights when trying to save a mare that is in shock.

I have had several mares loose pregnancies at about 7 to 9 months over the years, and most were flushed for at least three days in a row and infused with genticin or betadine.

Edited to add: If the foals was a dystocia as well, there could have been lacerations in the vagina or uterus that are now infected.
Maryanna Haymon




This sounds too awful for even words ... has anyone on the board had a foal aborted due to hydrops? What exactly is it? Was the mare okay in the end and was she breedable afterwards? Was a cause ever found???

Here is an article on the subject dealing specifically with equine hydrops:

http://dvm.adv100.com/dvm/article/articleDetail.jsp?id=13320

Just one more thing for us breeders to now worry about isnt it? No matter HOW rare it might be ... and then you pray that your vet is even able to diagnos it even if they have never come across it before ...

[madvoice]

TCF, please don't post links to other forums. Its part of our forum rules. If you can, copy the info on the other forum's thread and paste it in here for information. Also, the image you have linked to is rather disturbing and may not be suitable to the younger members (just a thought ok). The information is very interesting nonetheless and we appreciate you sharing it with us.

[TrueColoursFarm]

madvoice - I tried that initially but there were something like 64 icons in the copied and pasted post, so I gave up trying to whittle it down to eliminate all of them!
I hope the basis of what happened is able to come through now in thie VERY condensed version ...

[madvoice]

I'm currently looking for more information on this topic as it is very interesting to me I'll post any results from my search.

Edit - Some extra reading.

http://veterinaryrecord.bvapublicati...act/123/20/513

From what information I've been able to gather, hydrops is considered to be caused by a genetic abnormality in human foetus' and may be related in that instance to equine hydrops.