Submitted by Pia Kahila, EasyCare Customer
In 2008 I bought a 14 year old finnhorse, Helu-tähti. We pulled her shoes after she came to our place and started doing a barefoot trim. As it was already Autumn, we ordered two pairs of Easyboot Epics and the studs to go with them. We even rode on the solid frozen lake in the Winter.
Sadly, in January 2010 she was diagnosed with navicular disease. I was told that the lameness would be constant and the horse couldn’t be ridden anymore. I decided not to give up after doing some research. I found out that some people had used foam pads with a hole for the frog successfully. Then I found that EasyCare had comfort pads that could do just that. The comfort pads arrived, and you could notice an instant relief when there wasn’t any pressure on the frog.
As the navicular had also caused bowed tendons in both front feet, with the help of the Bowed Tendon Book, by Tom Ivers, and our comfort pads in our Epics, we started our rehabilitation by walking in hand every day. Each day we walked a little longer than the day before. When the summer came we were doing four km walks and it was time to speed up to a trot, so we got a carriage and started driving. For the summer we also got a pair of the old style Easyboot Grips so we didn’t need to remove the studs from our Epics. In the Autumn we slowly started doing some riding work and in January we could have started doing cantering in the rehabilitation program, but we thought it best to wait until the Spring when the ground would be safer to canter. So, we just did slow hacks in our boots and enjoyed the Winter. All the while we had the comfort pads to keep the pressure off the frog.
Finally in the Spring we started cantering and galloping and in the Autumn we did even a couple of small jumps and she stayed perfectly sound.
Sadly in the next February she died of colic. But even if we didn’t have a very long journey together, our greatest success was getting her sound again after navicular, and that wouldn’t have been possible without Easyboots and comfort pads. Thank you, EasyCare for giving us more time together.