The Horse Doctor

In the past, an injury to your horses suspensory ligament frequently meant the end to their athletic career. Treatment consisted of enforced rest and anti-inflammatory medications, sometimes for a year with inconsistent results. In the last few years several newer treatment modalities have been developed to treat tendon/ligament injuries in the horse. Extra corporeal shock wave treatment and Stem-cell implantation have been the most popular. Recently a newer treatment called PRP for Platelet Rich Plasma has been developed. PRP has been found to contain the following growth factors promoting tissue healing- transforming growth factor beta (TGF-b) platelet-derived growth factor (PDGF) insulin-like growth factor (IGF) vascular endothelial growth factors (VEGF) epidermal growth factor (EGF) fibroblast growth factor-2 (FGF-2) Many of these factors have been shown to enhance one or more phases of osteogenesis. PDGF, EGF, and FGF-2 have been shown to stimulate proliferation of osteobl...

While I don't shy away from politic on this blog it is far from my primary focus as many blogs are. During an election year...and it seems every year is an election year, the venom spit out on the blogosphere gets worse with each passing day. Now political campaigns use the web and blogs like pamphlets and buttons of years gone by. I have been bothered by the incredibly sharp edge to these ads this year and by the focus of the mainstream press in particular. I saw a recent poll showing that a majority of Americans now view all Journalists as partisan and actually have to much influence in our political process...unfortunate. To be clear here I am good friends with John McCains son Andy and his family. They grew up in Jacksonville and we still see them even though they now live out of state. Yesterday the Obama campaign released an add attacking John McCain for being out of touch because he can't even send an email. Here is the add What I find amazing is that there is nobody at...

My kids did Capoeira in school . It is a type of Martial arts dancing that my boys thought was really fun. This video is hilarious and shows why you should never show off.

I was at the Zoo this morning to do an echocardiogram on a 16 year old Florida panther. This is the 1st that I've been able to work on up close and personal. They are really remarkable animals. It compares in size to the Jaguar I did last week. Big feet and really big teeth. While the panther has soon health issues it was still the highlight of the day.

We just got back from a week long trip to Costa Rica. I heard from a friend that American airlines was going to change their reward miles program so I should use them now. We wanted to go back to Costa and take all the kids and allow me to surf during the BIG season. We flew into San Jose and rented a 7 passenger SUV and headed into the mountains. We went up to the Arenal volcano and went to hot springs at "Baldi ". The kids said it was one of the highlights of the trip with many pools throughout the lush gardens that averaged 104 degrees from the volcanic heat. We then headed up to the Hacienda Guachipelin , a hotel/ranch up on the side of another volcano. Here is one of my emails back during the trip that i was asked to post....remember that I did these at night after dinner and several Imperial's (local beer). It's day 3 on the Adventura Costa Rica. We are at the Haciedna Guachipelin for another nite. Today we were up at 7am and really stiff from the climb up and...

There has been a report of piroplasmosis at an Ocala area Hospital. Here is an excerpt from the FAEP report. " Equine Piroplasmosis (EP) is a blood-borne parasitic disease which is caused by two organisms, Theileria equi ( formerly Babesia equi) and Babesia caballi . It is primarily transmitted to horses by ticks; however, the disease can be spread mechanically from animal to animal by contaminated needles. The disease was eradicated from Florida in the 1980's and the tick species generally believed to transmit this disease in other countries have not been identified in Florida in many years. This disease is not directly contagious from one horse to another but requires direct blood transfer. Human infection with equine piroplasmosis is extremely rare. Acutely affected horses can have depression, fever, anemia, jaundiced mucous membranes and low platelet counts. Equine Piroplasmosis can also cause horses to have roughened hair coats, constipation, and colic. In its milder ...

I had an interesting call this week about Chronic Fatigue Syndrome in horses. I know there is much debate about the issue in people and actually a lot of research that is still remarkably inconclusive. When you do a google search for chronic fatigue syndrome, horses , you come up with 432,000 hits. Almost every page references reports from Dr. Walter Tarello in Italy. If you have read anything I have written then you know I'm a skeptic and with this one my bullshit-ometer is redlining. I have read his publicatio ns and have some serious questions as to scientific method and the conclusions made ( much less how it even got published). I do not doubt that these cases are sick, they have fever, weight loss and lethargy. What I do doubt is the diagnosis and the way it was arrived at. "After staining with the Wright technique, slides were microscopically examined (x100) showing the presence of micrococci-like organisms on 5-6% of Red Blood Cells, and the absence of alternative ca...

I came across this video that is absolutely shocking from C-SPAN. I'm sure the high gas prices are hurting everyone, but I can tell you first hand that it is brutal for Equine Veterinarians. With four Vets driving into 5 counties the fuel costs are staggering and forcing us to increase our trip charges. I find it odd that we are virtually the only country that so restricts the amount of domestic energy production. We complain about electrical shortages in California, yet they have not built a new power plant in over 20 years. We complain about high gas prices but haven't built a new refinery in over 30 years and currently are at maximum production. Each year we import more of our energy and transfer more and more of our wealth to other countries. I don't know if the final answer is increased coal production (we have 27% of the worlds coal deposits), nuclear, wind,solar, hydrogen our geothermal....but I think we need an "ALL OF THE ABOVE " approach for now. Over ...

For several years we have had the ability to use stem cell therapy in our patients. We harvest fat cells from the Gluteal region of the patient and ship them to a company Vet-Stem that concentrates the adult stem cells and ships them back to us for injection into damaged tendons and ligaments. There are now many new uses being developed such as intra-articular injection for treating arthritis or OCD lesions. Stem cells are the precursor cells for all cells in the body. They are called pleurepotent stem cells and are the first cells that appear during embryonic development. They then mature into the various organs and tissues of the body from brain and bone to skin and hair. It is really quite amazing and the signaling process has yet to be fully understood. What we do know is that adult stem cells are present is significant numbers in adipose tissue and bone marrow and behave in similar ways to embryonic stem cells. When these cells are injected into tissue they develop into cells th...

The Forum today was a big success and very well attended. I thought I would post the work sheet here for those that are interested. It's a simple list to help you set up a disaster preparedness plan for your farm. Disaster Preparation Work Sheet Jacksonville Equine Associates LLC Store forms in a secure waterproof folder or on a CD or Thumb Drive and take it with you. 1.Farm location- Flood zone. www.msc.fema.gov __________________________ print map and attach to plan 2. Follow storm progress -Internet- www.wunderground.com/tropical/ -TV- local stations -Radio- local stations, have extra batteries should power go out 3.Evacuation Plan- Locations- http://www.ssh...

On June 28th I will be speaking at the Equestrian Center as part of the Equine Disaster Preparedness Forum. We did this a few years ago and it was quite informative, however this years will be on a much larger scale ( 500-1000). I will talk about what you need to do to get ready for and survive a hurricane. This stems from what a good friend of mine went through in Miami during Hurricane Andrew. He called it the 5 things you need. As we prepared for some big storms ,that fortunately didn't hit , we expanded the list trying to take in as many variables as possible and what was required to be ready. Last years worksheet can be found here at JAXEQUINE.COM. While our big focus remains hurricanes we also have to be aware of fires and floods, both of which have been in the news as of late. If you are interested you can sign up for the forum at EquineDisasterPreparedness.com hope to see you there. 8:00 am

With the Belmont Stakes coming up this weekend and a chance for the first Triple Crown winner in 30 years there will be more attention focused on Big Brown. The New York Times published an article about the use of anabolic steroids in the horse racing industry and specifically in Big Brown. It should be noted that there are a lot of uses for anabolic steroids and many horses need them, primarily geldings ( no do-dads....no testosterone). They are also useful in treating muscle injury and anemia. Unlike humans there is no scientific evidence that anabolic steroids improve racing performance. (Fillies do show improved performance since they have little testosterone). This is most likely due to the fact that horses are already running at near peak anatomical and physical performance. Simply put, they just might not be capable of running any faster than they are right now. Unfortunately, the racing industry, trainers and owners like many of the general public are convinced that it these ...

There is a report on Jacksonville.com of a horse with Eastern Equine Encephalitis in St Johns county. EEE also called sleeping sickness ,like the other encephalitis viruses (Western,Venezuelan and West Nile) are transmitted by mosquitoes . The reservoir for the virus are birds. Once bitten by mosquitoes the virus is then transmitted to any animal that the mosquito chooses to feed on next. Horses are acutely susceptible to the encephalitis viruses and are at increased risk since they are outside (without the benefit of clothes) most of the day. Humans in the nudist colony would be equally susceptible. Since there is now a positive case we know that the virus is in the local bird population and horses are at risk. The vaccine is very effective at preventing infection but the peak immunity is only up to 4 months. This means that all horses should have a booster vaccine this summer, 4 months after their previous vaccine. This should protect them until their fall vaccinations. The...

I just heard a disturbing comment from a friend in Ocala. Since the national uproar over horse slaughter caused the closure of the last plants in Texas ,there has been a problem with unwanted horses. It now appears that those horse are being released into the Ocala National Forest. With rising feed cost ( the idiotic plan of using corn for fuel production) some owners must be unable to feed some of these horses and opt to turn them loose. I haven't been able to confirm this report but they were adamant. I will check with other sources and see if this is true, if so it can't be good for the horses ( thoroughbreds) ....they aren't mustangs.

There have been several horse show signs of acute liver dysfunction recently while eating Purina feeds. The company seems to have jumped on this quickly and found an aflatoxin (mold toxin) contamination from one of their suppliers. It only affects 3 of their plants and the North eastern United States.The following states are under the recall, Connecticut; Delaware; Maine; Maryland; Massachusetts; New Hampshire; New Jersey; New York; North Carolina; Pennsylvania; Rhode Island; South Carolina; More info on Aflatoxins can be found HERE . " Aflatoxins are potent toxic, carcinogenic, mutagenic, immunosuppressive agents, produced as secondary metabolites by the fungus Aspergillus flavus and A. parasiticus on variety of food products. Among 18 different types of aflatoxins identified, major members are aflatoxin B1, B2, G1 and G2. Aflatoxin B1 (AFB1) is normally predominant in amount in cultures as well as in food products. Pure AFB1 is pale-white to yellow crystalline, odorless so...

The AAEP list serve ( American Association of Equine Practitioners) has been having a vigorous debate about the tragic death of Eight Bells and where we need to pursue changes to help prevent these catastrophic injuries. While the statistics show only a 0.2% occurrence rate , it is still awful when it happens. Unfortunately many pundits are stating opinion and not science and filling the 24 hour news cycle with talk about what is wrong with the racing industry. I'm sure there are those that don't like horse racing or people doing anything with a horse for that matter ( ie .PETA). Thats OK, it's there opinion....I don't like soccer, so we're even. The public needs to be made aware of all the oversight that occurs during a horse race, from drug testing to physical exams . Video of each race is reviewed by the stewards to look for any action that is deemed to be abusive or dangerous, which can lead to fines or suspensions. I'm not sure why Veterinarians are p...

Like everyone else I was amazed at the performance of Big Brown in the Kentucky Derby and terribly saddened at the tragic loss of eight bells. Here we are almost a year after Barbaro was injured and the racing industry suffers another setback and the fans must witness another heartache. Sadly another thing to come from this is the media whirlwind that has spun up creating an endless stream of stories about the dangers of horse racing and all that is wrong. PETA has even taken the opportunity to grab some headlines at the fillies expense by saying the jockey should be suspended , implying "he must have known something was wrong" and that the winnings for 2nd place should be withheld. They complained about the use of the crop saying " the merciless whipping of the horse". First you must realize that the average jockey is not much bigger than most 8th graders (no offense) , is perched atop a 12oo lb animal going faster than 30mph while reaching behind them to "wh...