My horse and I are both Lame and an Update on PRP Therapy

I realized that I never gave an update on how the PRP (Platelet Rich Plasma) therapy went.   A few months ago I decided to give a fairly new therapy a try to help my arthritic knee.   Essentially the medical pros take blood from your arm, centrifuge it, extract the platelets from the blood and inject the platelets and plasma into your knee in hopes of regenerating cartilage and providing some pain relief.    Its been FDA approved but because the results are still iffy and its not been determined which patients it works for and which not, insurance usually will not cover it.

Golly enjoying his "vacation"

I decided to give it a try though and while it did help the achiness in the soft tissue, it did not make much difference in the join pain so I decided to move forward with my second knee replacement which is scheduled for tomorrow.

About the same time that I decided to go for the second knee replacement, Golly came up lame and after a vet exam, it was determined that he had a mild suspensory pull and was confined to stall rest.  He has been in his stall for the last month and is now allowed out part of the day in a small paddock part of the day.   Lest you feel sorry for him, he's living the life of luxury as my girlfriend is loaning me her big airy double stall for him and his current job is his favorite thing -- doing nothing... and eating.

Its been a bit of a struggle making sure his belly is full, he is occupied mentally and he doesn't gain weight but I'll fill you in on that in another post.

He will be starting rehab with hand walking a couple of weeks before I can ride and then once I can ride, we will start with just walking for ten minutes at a time -- perfect timing for us both as we will both have limited ability.   Only major issue is that I have to rely on GREAT friends to do the hand walking and do the first couple rides under saddle ... just in case he is a bit frisky the first time out.

Stay tuned for some recovery pics as this knee heals.