As you might be well aware I’ve enjoyed great success with my acupuncture decompression of
tendons and ligaments. But I’ve had limited exposure to treating what I call tendonitis. To me
tendonitis occurs primarily in young training horses, yearlings and early two year olds. They
appears as thickened and maybe slightly sore, usually hard, tendons, usually affecting the
most proximal aspect of the tendon first. As with bows, they are seldom lame at exercise. They
generally correct themselves with time. Some people apply a blister; I’ve never had one Be a
long term issue. On ultrasound exam they generally present with a diffuse edema with overall
tendon enlargement rather than the separated fibers and large fluid gaps with a bowed tendon.
So anyway wouldn’t you know my own horse goes through this huge growth spurt and the next
thing I know his tendons seem hard and thickened. We give him a little time off, some bute and
Dex,and they still look the same after a week. So I decide to poke him. (scientifically called
percutaneous decompression). The results are quite dramatic. Below are the images. He’s not
normal after the first treatment:we want the tendon to be 1.2-1.3 cm2. But they’re close; about
1.4 cm2 Down from 1.9 cm2 and 2 cm2 . So I treated him again . I will also apply a localized
blister and walk him another 2-3 weeks to allow the fibers and the overall tendon to normalize.
But 1 month off sure beats the usual 4 months.
May 1, 2018
H.O. Ferguson, DVM
