necropsy findings

[krp]

On prelimary findings - the subject had severly bruised organs and hemoriging throughout, bruised brain. What could this be from? Is this something that would be long term or short term before the subject would die? Would someone be able to tell if the subject was hemoriging? Still waiting on final results, but just prelimary are just crushing for me. Subject has been boarded at a vet hospital.

[henthorn]

krp, sounds like the preliminary findings will lead them to look for causes. Probably a clotting disorder or connective tissue disease. Of course, I don't know the history of the horse's illness that might lead to clues. Too soon to say. Sorry about the horse, though. Is it yours?

[madelyn]

Tough to say from the description, except it sounds like shaken-baby syndrome in humans. Or a major impact...

[krp]

There is something else to throw in the mix. The state examiner stated that my horse die of a violent death. He looked as if he went a few rounds with Mike Tyson. My horse was fine at 10:30 a.m. and again during the picking of his paddock between 11 - 11:30. When they went to feed him lunch around 1:00, he was gone. No evidence of a struggle, the ground wasn't ruffed up. He just went.

[freshman]

Just wondered if this bruising and hemmorhage occurred pre or post-mortem? Sometimes the horse is dropped during transport to the cooler just after its death.

It is usually impossible to draw any conclusions from a incomplete necropsy report like was supplied here and the preliminary report lacks the reslults from the labortory and histopath samples that were done.

Especially when there is no history of the type of illness the horse suffered prior to its death, guessing is usually futile.

My deepest sympathies for the lose of your horse. Perhaps the final necropsy report will supply some answers about your horse's death. Some sort of history about the horse's illness, ie why it was a the vet clinic, might elicit helpful responses.

[Rococoms]

IMO, sounds like there could have been a episode of DIC (http://www.addl.purdue.edu/newsletters/ ... er/DIC.htm), possibly secondary to a primary onset acute colic episode. Did the necropsy report say anything about a colon torsion, or rupture? Hemo-abdomen, or other obvious sepsis? An acute colic episode could easily cause the trauma described, then it's unusual, but not unlikley for the trauma to cause DIC.

Good luck finding closure- these things are always terrible, but so much more so when there doesn't appear to be any mitigating factors.

[krp]

Colt was in refresher training. He was a little sore on his hips so they call the vet in. After radiographs, it was discovered that he had OC. The following day he was taken to Dr. Richardson, who performed the surgery, this was in May 06. We opted to keep him at our vet facility so that he could be watched carfully and get shots that were required after surgery. He was stalled bound until a month ago, when he started going to his paddock for an hour a day then 2 hours a day. He has been staying in his paddock for about 8 hours now and doing fine, no problems. We choose to keep him at the vet for precaution nothing else.

[krp]

Med. examiner stated that the horse was brusied from the head to the chest. No hemotoma's, no clotting, and all organs looked good. He has set out slices of the organs for more lab tests.

[krp]

Received the necropsy findings report from the medical examiners office today. It states the cause of death was trama to the throat latch. All findings are not consistant with what my vet told me. The medical examiner even stated that there was no way my colt died in his paddock. What should I do now, if anything?

[Rococoms]

Wow, tough situation. Sounds like it depends on what you plan on doing. If you intend to open some sort of wrongful death or think there was some sort of foul play or mistreatment involved in the animals death, then I think you will probably have to secure a laywer to suponea all the medical records and interview all the people who work at the place to see if you can get a clear story of what happened. Short of that... it's terrible, it's tragic, it's awful... but I don't think you're going to get much other closure.

[TrueColours]

krp - I had posted a link to this thread over on another forum and this is what one of the posters came back with today on it:

The details are sketchy, but there are some things which don't make sense. Whoever the "medical examiner" is got it wrong; bruises ARE hematomas, so there is an inconsistency there. Also, trauma to the throatlatch in the presence of what they perceive to be widespread bruising is a bit impossible to accept unless there are histologically demonstrated true hemorrhages and fractures of the cartilaginous and/or osseus elements in the area.
One responder mentioned postmortem artifact as a cause for the "widespread" bruising - I think that postmortem blood pooling is a more likely explanation for these changes. If there was a traumatic event which caused bruising not only to the brain but also all of the organs, there would definitley be some external indication of it, even if it was only bruising of the skin without osseous fractures. You cannot have extreme trauma to the inner organs without some indication of it on the tissue through which the impact must pass.
Inexperienced "medical examiners" often mistake postmortem pooling artifact for hemorrhage.
If I were the owner I would want blood tests, proof of the throatlatch issue (can be independantly assessed by another pathologist by looking at the histological findings), and a timeline on when the colt died and what the interval was to necropsy. Blood tests may reveal an infection, poisoning or congenital syndrome (I assume he is young as he is referred to as a colt) which would explain widespread bleeding - if this is not artifactual.
Not good enough for me - I would be asking mega questions.

Does that make sense at all???