[HairOfTheDog]

I'm gonna repost some bits I wrote earlier to answer the same question....

Unlike a person, or even a dogs, the lower leg of a horse has practically no soft tissue, no muscle that is rich with blood supply, it is all bone and ligament, and the leg and hoof does not get the blood supply it needs to function, let alone heal, unless it can move. Movement is circulation to a horse.

The goal will be to get the leg stabilized enough so he can be turned out to pasture to move as soon as is possible. A horse's health deteriorates rapidly from inactivity.

Horses are too big to roll around in wheelchairs, and cannot lay down for long periods and have normal function either. To digest food, they need to move. To feed their legs with oxygen, they need to move, to breath, they need to move. A horse will get pneumonia merely from standing too long unable to lower their head to drain their sinus. They fear laminitis, a debilitating foot condition, in his "good" back leg, because while it's supporting all the weight, it is nearly as immobile as the bad leg. It's very complicated to rehab a horse from an injury this serious.

[Westlander]

Thank You.

[DejaJude]

Horses are too big to roll around in wheelchairs, and cannot lay down for long periods and have normal function either. To digest food, they need to move. To feed their legs with oxygen, they need to move, to breath, they need to move. A horse will get pneumonia merely from standing too long unable to lower their head to drain their sinus.

That is how a friend of mine lost a horse. It got a really nasty infection from a splinter and was put in a sling. It developed pneumonia and died from that.

[Diddle E. Squat]

I read (in yesterday's thread?) that sometimes a horse can even survive with just 3 legs. So I wonder with severe cases why they couldn't amputate above the fracture and put on some type of prosthetic replacement leg below, so that they could begin walking as normally as possible almost immediately. I would guess such an artificial limb would be a complicated device if it could get close to recreating a horse's natural leg movements, but with today's technology it would seem possible.

[The Red Zone]

The report sounds as if this horsie was actually walking on the mended leg already. It sure looks well screwed together from the picture. Bravo for the veterinarians who continue to work on technology, it often comes back to help people in some way.

[kms61]

http://www.wafb.com/Global/story.asp?S=4894818

interesting story here. A shetland pony is not a throughbred, but this seems to be a breakthrough.

[Eclectica]

Horses are too big to roll around in wheelchairs

It would have to be a large wheelchair, but they make devices similar to training wheels for dogs with mobility issues. (Spinal- and leg- injuries).

One suitable for a horse would allow him to run around, circulate blood, but not overstress the leg. 'Wonder why "training wheels" weren't considered for this horse?