Isabel presented to Stuart after her owners noticed that she had separated from her field mates. Once brought into the stable she was quidding and unable to eat haylage.

On examination, a significant swelling of Isabel’s right lower jaw was noted. As we were suspicious of a dental issue, after antibiotics and anti-inflammatories were administered to control her temperature and provide some comfort, radiographs (X-rays) were taken. This revealed a tooth root infection of the 3rd cheek tooth on her right lower jaw. The infection had caused lots of bony reaction with thinning and loss of parts of the jaw – the red arrow on the radiograph points towards this.

Once Isabel was stabilised and at the clinic, we proceeded with extracting the infected tooth under standing sedation and local anaesthesia (a nerve block). The tooth came out in one piece and as you can see, it was a whopper!!

Tooth root infections commonly occur in youngsters just several months after tooth eruption. Although Isabel now has one less tooth in her mouth, she is pain free and was very quickly back to eating happily as you can see.