August: Rascal’s Close Call

Case of the Month: Rascal’s Close Call

Rascal was found in his pasture, one late summer morning.  With a gaping wound on the inside of his upper right fore.   On examination, the wound was about 10cm x 4 cm (large) with a pocket tracking up the leg.  The radial bone was exposed and part of the flexor carpi radialis muscle was severed.  Rascal was shockingly not lame on the leg.   The tension present due to the damaged muscle and location of the wound only enabled the vet to get two sutures in the wound, pulling tissue over the bone, applying a “biologic bandage” but not fully closing the cut as the pocket it had needed to drain.  Exposed bone is a big infection risk, as well as if the outer skin of the bone dries out it can die and form a “sequestrum” which is dead, infected bone that would require surgical debridement and would prevent the wound from healing.  The owner was very eager to learn how to flush and bandage the wound daily and did diligently for 3 weeks, with the vet checking on it weekly.  The horse was also put on antibiotics prophylactically.  Many wounds don’t require antibiotics, but infection risk was high.  Three weeks later the wound was totally filled in with no signs of infection.  The gelding will have a scar and the owner is now very good at bandaging but overall a very happy ending to an otherwise bad injury!