A horse, like any other animal you choose to keep, can get sick.
If you ask me, horses are probably the most high maintenance animals requiring you to always observe what they eat, where they sleep and what they do. However, even with proper care, your horse might still get sick or even get injured during everyday activities. It is always recommended that once you notice signs that your horse is ill, you should hasten to get it checked by a veterinary. In this article, I will be sharing with you helpful tips and generally, some basics on how to care for your sick horse assuming you’ve already gotten your horse checked by a vet, have you? This is important.
Importance of acting swiftly
Aside from viral and bacterial infections which are almost always fatal but not common, diseases like Tetanus and Colic can prove fatal when treatment is delayed.Colic,for instance, is dangerously common and is the cause of hundreds of horse deaths every year in the U.S. Most of these horses die in veterinary hands or even after surgical procedures. The underlying factor here is that the more treatment is delayed, the fewer chances the animal has. When it comes to colic, it is the responsibility of the owner to detect the signs and I do not mean the problem itself. It’s not easy to pinpoint exactly what your horse is suffering from but the fact that it is suffering is sufficient. You know your horse better than anybody else, look out for behavioural changes and act on insight.Do you have a suspicion that your horse is not okay?It probably isn’t. If your horse is suffering from colic – find out more here. Always act on intuition and avoid self-medicating until you have consulted a vet.
While caring for your unhealthy horse
Here are things to put in mind while caring for your unhealthy horse.
l Once the horse is released to go back with you, your vet will give you instructions on how to look after the horse until it fully recovers. It is imperative to follow these instructions to the latter. Keep up the given medication even when the horse looks like it has recuperated.
l It is best to make sure that your sick horse drinks more water than it usually would because some medications require more consumption of water. Avoid dehydrating the horse since it will only worsen the problem and stall recovery.
l Just like a sick person, a sick horse will need you to be extra clean. Make sure that its stall is devoid of droppings and if possible disinfected.
l An unhealthy horse is weak and susceptible to health issues. Do not assume the normal cold night is okay, get some old blankets and cover up the horse.
l It is important to feed the horse in small quantities because it’s good for the digestive tract, but also make sure that the horse is fed frequently in order to attain the normal amount of feed required a day.
More often than not, horses solder on with a health problem until they can no longer bear it. Do not make it worse by ignoring even the slightest of signs because your reaction is probably the only chance your horse has and depends on.
