Seat, colon, cæcum; hair of oat seed, clover leaf, vine tendrils, hair
of horse, nucleus, calcic admixture, straw, in horses on dry food,
with depraved appetite, or with skin disease. Symptoms: none, or
torpid bowels, colics, recurring, fermentations, tympany, obstruction,
rupture, peritonitis, rectal exploration. Lesions: impacted ball, with
excess of liquid and gas in front, rupture, ragged bloody edges.
Treatment: extraction, enemata, eserine, barium chloride.
Hair balls, received the name of egagropiles because of their discovery
in the alimentary canal of the wild goat, but they are found in various
forms in all the domestic animals. In _horses_ they occupy the cæcum and
colon and are most frequently composed of the fine vegetable hairs that
surround the grain of the oat, or the leaf of clover, of the woody
tendrils of vines, and of the hairs of themselves and their fellows
taken in at the period of moulting. They sometimes contain a nucleus of
leather or other foreign body which has been swallowed but in many cases
no such object can be found, the hair having become rolled and felted by
the vermicular movements of the stomach and intestines. An admixture of
mucus assists materially in the felting, and calcareous and magnesian
salts may make up the greater part of the mass, rendering it virtually a
_calculus_. They may further have a large admixture of straw and
vegetable fibres of larger size than oat or clover hairs. They are most
frequent in horses kept on dry food, (sweepings of oatmeal mills) and at
hard work, and which show depraved appetite and lick each other. Omnibus
horses suffer more than army horses. Skin diseases, by encouraging
licking, contribute to their production.
_Symptoms._ In the great majority of cases hair balls do not seriously
incommode the horse. They do not attain a large size, and being light do
not drag injuriously on the intestine and mesentery. They do, however,
retard the movement of the ingesta, and when grown to a considerable
size they may block the intestine, more particularly the pelvic flexure,
the floating colon or rectum. Under such conditions they produce colics
which may be slight, transient, and recurrent, or severe and even fatal,
having all the characteristics of complete obstruction from other
causes. Fermentations, tympanies, and straining without defecation are
common features. When the obstruction takes place in the pelvic flexure,
the floating colon or rectum, it may often be detected by rectal
exploration. When complete obstruction occurs all the violent symptoms
of that condition are present, and these may pass into those of rupture
(Peuch, Leblanc, Neyraud), and shock or peritonitis. If the animal has
passed hair balls even months before, the colics may with considerable
confidence be attributed to other balls of the same kind.
_Lesions._ In case of death there are the usual lesions of gaseous
indigestion, with or without enteritis, but with the accumulation of a
great quantity of liquid contents, above the ball, which is felt as a
firm body impacted in the gut. In other cases the distended bowel has
given way and the liquid contents and often the hair ball as well are
found free in the abdominal cavity. In such a case the edges of the
laceration are covered with blood clots and thickened with inflammatory
exudation, and there is more or less peritonitis.
_Treatment._ Relief may sometimes be obtained by the extraction of a
hair ball lodged in the rectum or adjacent part of the floating colon.
In other cases abundant soapy or oily enemata, and the employment of
eserine or barium chloride subcutem are indicated.