Research project blog-READ THIS IF CONSIDERING FELLOWSHIP AT EQUINE ANALYSIS SYSTEMS!

After presentation of my project to the vets at EAS, our office manager asked me to write a blog post for the company website about my experience here and the findings of my research. Please follow the link www.equinanalysis.com/news to find my post, and learn the results of my project. To anyone considering applying for this internship in the future, please please take the time to read this, as I believe it explains the views of the company quite well and will give students an idea of what to expect when coming to Equine Analysis Systems. Cheers from Kentucky,
Nicole

Week 8

Hello again! We never slow down is the official theme at Rood and Riddle! Surgery has stayed busy with some great learning experiences! It is weaning time in Kentucky which unfortunately results in many lacerations and sadly fractures. A foal was presented at the clinic to fix a complete calcaneus fracture. The picture to the right is of the fracture prepped and ready to go in surgery before Dr. Ruggles fixed it. You can see the severe angle and swelling of the leg.












Dr. Ruggle place 2 plates to fix the fracture and allow the foal a chance to grow normally.

 

My favorite thing will always be colic surgeries! I was able to help out with some late night colic surgeries where one horse had a small intestinal torsion. 

 Pictured above is about 10 feet of necrotic small intestine that needed to be resected!

Finally there was another Ovariectomy performed on a mare with a tumor. Unlike the surgery that was performed earlier in the summer where the horse was not placed under general anesthesia, this mare was placed under general anesthesia and placed dorsally on a table and the ovary was removed. It was really interesting to the see the same surgery performed in 2 drastically different techniques. If there is one thing I have learned it is to keep an open mind and learn as many techniques as possible! 

  Ovary after it was removed! 

 

On that note, I would like to end this week with two of the amazing hard working interns at RREH! Dr. Lauren Mundy and Dr. Liz Anderson! They are flushing a septic joint on a foal! Working hard day and night! 

Thanks everyone for reading!! 

Surgery Case

Although Cleveland Equine doesn't have a surgeon on staff, we do have an induction stall, hoist and anesthesia equipment, so once every month or two a surgeon comes in for a day to do a few surgeries if we have some cases. This month, we did a cryptorchid castration & umbilical hernia closure on a colt, a tie back surgery, and also a sort of "rhinoplasty":

This horse had managed to lacerate its nostril on a waterbucket. After being repaired, the nostril began to constrict over the following months until it was so small that it was limiting air intake and affecting performance.

Below is the right nostril for a size comparison:

So the horse was taken to surgery, where the alar fold and cartilage was removed and the nostril opened up so it was no longer restricting airflow.

Week 8 at Littleton Equine

This Monday I spent the day with Dr. Toppin. We had a referral for a 19 year old Quarter Horse gelding with a shoulder injury.  The owners found the horse with the injury after being out in pasture for a few days so we assume that he was kicked by one of the other horses. The referring veterinarian pulled pieces of bone when exploring the wound and recommended they came to Littleton for shoulder radiographs to know the extent of the damage. The leg was extremely swollen all the way down the leg to the fetlock.

 

Based on radiographs, we could see 2 bone chips off the humerus with the larger piece being the deltoid tuberosity. Dr. Toppin was able to pull out the small piece of bone, but the larger piece of bone was still attached to too much muscle to pull out. He recommended that the gelding stay so one of the surgeons could perform a standing surgery to remove it. Tuesday night Dr. Murray along with Dr. Robinson removed the piece of bone. Dr. Murray was nice enough to let me put on sterile gloves to feel the bone chip and the humerus. The chipped piece was very sharp and the humerus was very rough. No wonder the sweet guy was so painful!

He was such a good patient during the procedure and his entire stay in the hospital. His little girls were so excited he was able to go home Thursday! 

On Monday,  we also went to do a recheck on the paint gelding that had pericarditis. I am happy to report that he is doing wonderful! His heart looks great on ultrasound and his heart rate is down to normal. It was so nice to follow up on him after caring for him during his stay in ICU. 

Presentation at EAS

Yesterday I presented my findings from the last 8 weeks of research to the veterinarians at Equine Analysis. In attendance was also Dr. Mikael Holmstroem from Sweden. Dr. Holmstroem's is a veterinarian in Sweden as well as holds a PhD in equine conformation and performance analysis. He is also the developer of our FotoSelect system, which analyzes conformation and was a major tool in my research, so his attendance was very important. Talk about a little pressure!! The goals of this presentation were not only to share my work, but also for me to practice presenting my research concisely to a group of people whose time was worth much more than mine. It was an interesting experience, and I am glad to have reached some conclusions from this project. With 4 weeks left of my time here in Kentucky, I am looking forward to delving into some fun little projects that will hopefully result in a project for next years fellow!

A day at Rood and Riddle,visitors, and the upcoming sale

Here at Equine Analysis Systems, we have had a bit of down time to collect data and work on some of the company's other research goals. However, today starts an uphill climb into a very busy week, as we prepare for the Fasig-Tipton Keeneland Select Yearling Sale, as well as trips overseas for our veterinarians. In this unique sector of veterinary medicine, our veterinarians get the opportunity to not only work with elite horses, they also get the opportunity to travel the world in search of these elite horses for our clients. The yearling sale is an event in which consignors and breeders bring out their yearling crop that they wish to sell. Now, this does not mean that these are the inferior horses. Many operations breed with full intention to sell every young horse, while others may keep some and sell others based on bloodlines, build, etc. Often, elite horses are sent to the sales as yearlings because the owners know the horse will bring a high price now, and the new owner will take the chance of seeing how well the horse will perform. That new owner takes a big risk, but with big risk can come big reward, so the system works. Our role at this sale will be to look at horses for clients, take photos for analysis, and scan hearts for measurements. We then will produce a report that will help our client decide whether the horse in question is likely to fit the role they are selecting it for, be it a sprinter, turf runner, broodmare, or Kentucky Derby hopeful. While our hours at Equine Analysis are typically 9-5, sales are the time of year when we work like "real" equine vets and log long, busy hours. Cheers to late nights and early mornings!

But before all of that starts up, I'd like to share my "holiday" at Rood and Riddle this past Friday. The office was closed to observe the 4th of July, so I tagged along with Sarah Morelli and Dr. Friend at Rood and Riddle. We started the morning palpating and flushing mares, and ended it with a neurological case, a colic, a lameness at the Kentucky Horse Park, and a hoof wall injury. Somewhere between all of that, we stopped for lunch well before some people even have breakfast, laughed a lot, and learned a lot. Oh yeah, and I got peed on by a mare while I was flushing her uterus post-foaling. (Read: my arm entire arm was in her vagina while she urinated.) Needless to say, I was tired and smelly by the time I made it home. It was a great day though and a much needed break from my research computer. It is amazing the variety of careers a veterinary degree can lead to!

Until next time,
Nicole

Weeks 6,7 and 8 at SVEC

It appears I accidentally got a little behind on my blog posts!  I assure you, my negligence doesn't mean that nothing happened over the past few weeks.  I can't believe that we are already done with week 8 of the program and only have 4 weeks left here at Saginaw Valley Equine Clinic!  

In the past three weeks, I have had the opportunity to scrub into a few surgeries.  The funniest was a colt who was supposed to be a cryptorchid, meaning that one testicle had not descended into the scrotum.  However, when we anesthetized him and got him on the surgical table, his testes was clear as could be.  Instead of having a cryptorchid surgery, Dr. Williams was able to do a simple open castration.  Of course I was disappointed to not see a more interactive surgery, but the owners were quite pleased at the difference in their bill!  My favorite surgery was a hock OCD removal.  I really enjoy arthroscopic procedures so any time I get to scrub in on an arthroscopy I'm a happy girl! 

One thing that really struck me was how many horses have already begun developing Potomac.  I'm accustomed to seeing it later in the year so I was surprised to see our first case present in the middle of June.  We've already had five cases!  I had not had any prior experience administering oxytetracycline to horses intravenously, so having so many cases gave me plenty of opportunities to practice treatments.

Happy fourth of July everyone!