New Jersey Equine Clinic Week 1

Hello from Millstone Township, NJ! My name is Stefany and I will be a third year veterinary student this upcoming fall. This summer my fellowship is taking place at New Jersey Equine Clinic, a referral hospital located in central NJ. Being a northern NJ native, it’s nice to be somewhat close to home and be able to spend some time with my family. While there is housing accommodation at the hospital for students, I am actually staying in a beach town about thirty-five minutes away with my boyfriend Bryan and our dog Tundra. I have to take full advantage of the ocean while I can!

The hospital owner and chief of surgery is Dr. Jen Smith. A recent hire to the team is associate Dr. Liz Leahy, an MSU grad. GO GREEN! Dr. Leahy completed her intern year with Dr. Smith and the pair have actually known each other for some time as Dr. Leahy started off as farm and stable staff at this very hospital while in college. 

As NJ Equine Clinic is a referral hospital, the majority of my first week was spent in the surgery suite. Some surgeries performed included: 

• Bilateral cryptorchid - cryptorchidism refers to the condition in which one or both (in this case!) testicles do not descend normally into the scrotum. Testes start off in the abdomen in a fetus and need to make their way down past the inguinal canal into the scrotum. Sometimes they don’t make it all the way and need to be surgically found and removed. 

• OCD Surgery - OCD stands for Osteochondritis dissecans and is a relatively common developmental disease typically diagnosed in young horses once they are worked. Malformed cartilage leads to the development of cartilage and bone flaps that can cause inflammation of joints and eventually lead to arthritis, so the “flaps” need to be removed. 

• “Tie-back" procedure - this is one method used to treat laryngeal hemiplegia in horses, perhaps better known as “Roarers.” The noise made by these horses is due to paralysis of one or both arytenoid cartilages, cartilages of the larynx, due to lack of innervation to the muscle in charge of movement of the arytenoids on either side, respectively. 

Case Highlight: Arthroscopic flush of a navicular bursa 

This case became an emergency surgery as a horse was brought in that had stepped on a nail within a relatively longer time frame. With nail penetration into the foot, we primarily worry about compromise to the coffin joint, navicular bursa, and the tendon sheath. The fluid sample taken from the navicular bursa showed an elevated white blood cell count, indicative of an infection. During surgery, the bursa was flushed extensively (the solution to pollution is dilution!) and a regional limb perfusion was performed as well. See below for images!

Until next time! Here’s a photo of me with Danielle (LMU ’20) and Taylor (VT ’21), two students currently on externships. This was Taylor’s last week at the hospital, best of luck on your anesthesia rotation!