I"m trying to treat a founder please tell me how long this takes

My horse Roman and my mini slipped out the gate 2 weeks ago. Roman was hit by a car. There was nothing broken, but 3 days later he foundered. I got bute from the vet and have been using glucosamine. He is up and eating fine the vet said this is a shock founder. I can:t find any info for that. HELP??

Founder is another word for laminitis which is considered a chronic condition. You could search for "shock induced laminitis" to see if you find more info.

In the most basic terms, founder is caused when the 'cells' that hold the outside of the hoof to the inside of the hoof together can't grab onto each other anymore and the hoof loses its hold to the bone/muscle tissue.

If you can visualize a zipper or piece of velcro, the interior structure of the hoof is similar.

The hoof (the exterior hard part) 'hooks' onto the interior part and vice versa. They hold on to each other.

There are complex structures of protiens, vitamins/minerals, etc, that go into making the things the body needs to make these 'velcro' like structures hold the hoof to the actual bone tissue.

When these two velcro pieces start to separate b/c the body can't hold them together, that is what is refered to as Founder.

The horse can, in fact, completely 'step out' of his hoof (where the bone/muscle tissue is exposed and the hoof (hard part) is left on the ground) if laminitis is severe or untreated.