Case 9.—A three-year-old bay filly was found at pasture with one fore foot badly injured. The owner intended to destroy her, but a neighbor prevailed upon him to have her treated. Apparently the wound was of about a week's standing and in a very bad condition, filled with maggots and dirt. Both the navicular and coronary articulations were open. This wound was cleansed in the usual manner and the owner cared for the case the balance of the time because the distance from my office was too great to give her personal attention. She made an almost complete recovery in five months.
Case 10.—At two-year-old mule with an open navicular joint due to a barbed wire wound. Usual care was given this case and in five months recovery was complete and little scar is to be seen. This case received seven treatments.
Case 11.—An eighteen-months-old colt at pasture was found down and unable to rise without help. In addition to several wounds of lesser importance there was a large wound on the inner side of the elbow, the joint was open and the entire leg was greatly swollen and in a state of acute infectious inflammation. The colt could not walk, its temperature was 105°, pulse was rapid and respiration was a little hurried. After advising the owner to put the poor animal out of its misery I left the place. Four days later the owner came to my office and asked if he could borrow some old shears to "trim off some loose hide from that colt." He left the colt in the pasture and all the care it received was the regular application of a proprietary dusting powder. It made a complete recovery.
Case 12.—A family mare, heavy in foal, received a vertical wound of the fetlock joint inflicted by a disc-harrow. The cul-de-sac of the ligament of this joint was opened freely. The wound was dressed in the usual manner and again three days later when no suppuration had taken place. Four days later the patient gave birth to a colt and suckled it right along through her convalescence. This wound healed by first intention and seventy-nine days from the date of the injury the mare was driven to town, two and one-half miles distant, and showed but little lameness.
Phalangeal Exostosis (Ringbone)
This term is applied to exostoses involving the first and second phalanges (suffraginis and corona), regardless of their size, extent or location. It is a misnomer, in a sense, and the veterinarian is frequently obliged to spend considerable time with his clients in order to convince them that a spherodial exostosis of the proximal phalanx, in certain cases, is in reality "ringbone," even though there exists no exostosis which completely encircles the affected bone.
Etiology and Occurrence.—Exostosis of the first and second phalanges is usually due to some form of injury, whether it be a contusion, a lacerated wound which damages the periosteum, or periostititis and osteitis incited by concussions of locomotion, or ligamentous strain. Practically the only exception is in the rachitic form of ringbone which affects young animals.
There are predisposing causes that merit consideration, chief among which is the normal conformation of the coronet joint. This proclivity is constant; the normal interphalangeal articulation is an incomplete ginglymoid joint and while its dorso-volar diameter is great, this in no wise compensates for its disproportionately narrow transverse diameter. The pivotal strain which is sometimes thrown upon this articulation when an animal turns on one foot, as well as the tension which is put on the collateral ligaments when the inner or the outer quarter of the foot rests in a depression of the road surface, tends to detach the insertion of these ligaments or to cause fibrillary fractures of their substance.
Short, upright, pasterns receive greater concussion during fast travel on hard roads than do the longer more sloping and well formed extremities. Those who are advocates of the theory that this type of osteitis with its complications has its origin in the articular portion of the joint, claim that the upright pastern constitutes an important tendency toward ringbone. Howbeit, ringbone is an active, serious and frequent cause of lameness and it affects animals of all ages and occurs under various conditions. Horses having good conformation and kept at work wherein no great amount of strain is put upon these parts, are occasionally victims of this affection.
Classification.—The arrangement employed by Moller[21] is intensely practical and logical. He considers ringbone as articular, periarticular, rachitic and traumatic. A mode of classification that is common and in a practical way, good, is, high and low ringbone. When prognosis is considered, for instance, it is very convenient to state that the chances for recovery are much better in high ringbone than in low ringbone. The classification of Möller will be followed here.