Asthma

Question
How can you tell if your horse has asthma?

Answer
Sarah:

Thats a really good question. Although we dont refer to it as asthma in horses, horses do get an asthma like condition we call lower airway inflammatory disease (LAID) that can progress to its worst into a condition called Heaves. Many horses are probably affected with LAID due to how we keep them now. Being in barns exposed to dusts, barn molds, dusty feeds and hay etc have created this high occurence of LAID. It is a chronic condition that in mild forms causes a dry cough often worst during exercise or when inside and exposed to the indoor dusts and molds. It ias diagnosed presumptively by hearing certain lung sounds when a rebreathing exam is performed on the horse (listening to the lungs with a bag on the nose to make the horse breathe deeply). Craclkes and wheezes are often heard at the end of exhalation. To definitively diagnose the disease, we perform a bronchoalveolar lavage or a trans-tracheal wash. These procedures are done to produce samples of fluid from gthe lower airways that are then looked at under a microscope for inflammatory cells that indicate the presence of this disease. The preferable test is the bronchoalveolar lavage. Following the diagnosis, most horses are managed, since the disease is not "curable", with inhaled and systemic steroids, inhaled bronchodilators and significant environmental changes and control changes to reduce the exposure to the irritants that produce the signs. Response to therapy is also a way to presumptively diagnose the disease. the key to the certain diagnosis is getting a good vet to do a good respiratory exam, then also to get one of the samples i mentioned to evaluate the cell types. Also it is important to recognize the disease, if it is diagnosed, is not a curable disease, but must be managed over the lifetime of the horse. Many horses do just fine, but some continue to progress in severity as they age- requiring more intensive managment and medical intervention. I hope this helps some. I can certainly share more information on this if you require it and/or if you wind up having your horse diagnosed with this condtion. feel free to contact me again. good luck.