Nancy Lee DVM Equine Vet

This little guy peeled off his lower eye lid. Never cut off or give up on an eye lid laceration. A successful repair will prevent a lot of future eye problems.

This case definitely made me step back and analyze the situation of life and death. My donkey was savagely attacked by some dog, and the wounds were so deep and painful that I had to decide if he would be able to make it. He was trembling and dripping blood when I found him. His tail was chewed to the bone, and the tip of bone was showing. The slashes across his thighs were about 2.5" deep and through muscle. His abdomen had long lacerations through the skin, but thankfully not penetrating. So only after sedating and clipping areas, was I able to assess that no vital organs were compromised. I was unable to suture anything because the wounds were too jagged and concern of contamination was too great. I started antibiotics right away and banamine. The wounds drained profusely for a couple of weeks and then nice healthy granulation tissue filled in the gaping holes. Donkeys are tough, but this was another case that confirmed my belief in the body to heal if it is given the right environment. The yellow bandage is after 3 weeks and skin contracture is occurring. I didn't want to post too many of the first pictures as they were very graphic.

After a busy two weeks I've been delinquent in a topic. Following the hot weather and summer ideas is my final addition about anhydrosis, aka non-sweaters. Various causes are thought to attribute to anhydrosis, but like tying up the real cause is hard to elucidate. I find clients maybe slow to recognize the first signs. The most common presenting sign is working a horse at a light or moderate level on an 80f day and the horse is not sweating. They may first notice it is blowing and "panting" way more excessively than the work warrants. Just touching their bodies you can feel the extreme heat they are giving off and often if you take their temperatures it is 104-106f. It is imperative to implement immediate cooling measures for these horses as they cannot do it for themselves. A genetic predisposition is suspected with this disease and/or severe electrolyte imbalances. Hotter states such as FL experience this problem throughout the year. It is also theorized that the horses sweat glands become exhausted and stop producing sweat on demand. Treatments seem to be anecdotal with variable results. A horse given time off can come back sweating somewhat normally, however they never seem to sweat like a normal horse. I find early recognition of the signs and implementing some of the treatments such as the product One AC, additional electrolytes, and skin patches are available that I have been told help. Get your horses blood tested to rule out other metabolic disorders and thyroid levels. Often these are normal in a horse with true anhydrosis. This disease is very frustrating and performance limiting. For short distance sports hosing the horse off before competition can help, but it is very difficult to compete these horses during the hot months.

A week of more hot weather is on the way. My topic of the week is hyperthermia. Horses dissipate heat from their bodies through sweating and less effectively through breathing. Their giant muscle mass can create an extraordinary amount of heat through metabolism. After training in this weather it is very important to cool their core body temps down as quickly as possible. Body temperatures of 102-107F are not uncommon after high rates of continuous exercise. Ice Cold water over their entire bodies is crucial to heat dissipation and then scraping the heated water off their hair coats. If water is left on the body it will heat up in seconds and insulate the hair coat, therefore not help in cooling any longer. Fans are also important for evaporation. walking of the horses to promote circulation and blood flow through the large muscle groups also promoted faster cooling. Towels over the loins or neck are counterproductive because they heat up and trap heat, impairing the evaporation process. So please, do not be afraid to simply run cold water for 10-20 minutes all over the horses body in order to help a stressed horse cool off faster. This will not hurt their kidneys nor risk a tie up episode.