Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Today started out slow then picked up speed...neutered one cat, spayed another in the morning. The afternoon we looked at a traumatic horse eye injury, floated teeth and examined a lame mare. Horse eyes are prone to trauma due to their location in the skull. Most traumatic injuries result in some degree of corneal ulceration and are painful as the cornea is a very sensitive tissue. We usually examine the horse's eye after sedation (if needed), blocking the horse's upper eyelid (they have strong eyelid muscles!) and stain the eye first. We usually use fluorescein stain (the yellow stain your ophthalmologist uses on you) but we may use Rose Bengal stain if pinpoint ulcers are suspected. If the ulcer is fresh and does not need debridement (gently removing non-healing layers of cornea), we will put the horse on broad-spectrum eye antibiotics and atropine, which helps dilate the eye and offers pain relief by helping with spasms within the eye itself. If uncomplicated by fungal or bacterial organisms, most ulcers will heal fairly rapidly. Blood vessels will grow from the edges of the cornea and move in towards the ulcer to help heal; these vessels grow at a speed of approximately 1 mm a day and can give us an idea how the healing process is doing. Hopefully our eye case today will heal well; however, with horses, there can be a number of complications if healing does not progress as expected. Our lame horse this afternoon was most likely a subsolar abscess, which usually results due to a deep bruise in the sole which becomes infected and creates an abscess. She should do well with time and anti-inflammatories. So, our day started slow but, as happens a lot lately, picked up nicely this afternoon:)