Instructions
Contact your veterinarian to have the horse treated for the laminitis. Hopefully, you discover the problem and treat the horse effectively before the laminitis causes founders.
Remove the cause of the disease. Laminitis can be caused by excess feeding, poisoning, physical causes or medications, just to name a few of the possibilities. Discovering the cause and correcting it is the only way that you can start the road to recovery for your horse.
Offer support for your horse. Just like people, horses thrive when they feel love. Make sure that you spend time with your horse and let it know that you love it so that it will fight to get better.
Keep your horse's hooves properly trimmed. Recovering from laminitis or founder requires properly trimmed hooves. It is very important that you have them checked regularly. Weekly trims are sometimes recommended during recovery. In addition to regular trims, special boots or mats are sometimes needed to speed up recovery and make the horse more comfortable.
Stay abreast of the current research. Equestrian research programs at many universities, such as Louisiana State University, are making advances every day to help improve the quality of life for horses that have laminitis and founder.
How to Cope When Your Horse has Laminitis or Founder
Any horse that has laminitis, or inflammation of the lamellae in the hoof, is obviously in pain. In some extreme cases, laminitis can lead to founder, or separation and rotation of the coffin bone. Coping with seeing your horse in pain because of these conditions is difficult.