It's Christmas Eve and you can count your blessings. Count your blessings especially if you are a horse that doesn't have laminitis.
In spite of advancements in treatments, prevention, medication, and understanding the disease mechanism, laminitis continued to ruin the lives of countless horses this year. While we're making great strides with metabolic or endocrinopathic forms of the disease, the septic form of laminitis and its cousin, the dreaded support limb form, continue to challenge horses and humans alike.
Just ask one of the top racehorses in the world. St Nicholas Abbey has been the subject of several articles on the Hoof Blog since he broke his pastern back in the summer while training in Ireland. He's survived colic surgery and a broken pin in the fractured pastern, and now is trying to come through what we call "support limb laminitis". It's a common and all-too-frequent complication seen in horses recovering from surgery that disrupts the normal function and/or weightbearing process in the "good" leg.
Now it's Christmas Eve, and it seems poignant that we have a message from Coolmore Stud, the horse's owner, to let us know--and see--how the colt is doing. Vet surgeon Tom O'Brien generously details the colt's demeanor, routine and even his stall habits, and mentions again that the necrotic tissue in the diseased foot benefited from treatment with medical maggot debridement therapy.
Pick a star up in the sky tonight and wish on it for St Nicholas Abbey and the people who will be spending Christmas in his stall with him. And if your checkbook is handy, send a donation to the Animal Health Foundation, a leading funding source for laminitis research all over the world. Your donation will go right to work in the coffers of leading researchers who are determined that I will one day no longer be writing these articles on Christmas Eve, or any other night of the year.
Merry Christmas to you all. And thanks.
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Disclosure of Material Connection: The Hoof Blog (Hoofcare Publishing) has not received any direct compensation for writing this post. Hoofcare Publishing has no material connection to the brands, products, or services mentioned, other than products and services of Hoofcare Publishing. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.
