Friday, March 19, 2010

It finally feels like spring! Quiet morning at the office, then went out to float an older horse's teeth. Routine dental care will ensure that your horse will have a healthy set of teeth for most of their life! We offer dental specials with 10% discounts twice a year through our office and have both a hand float set and a power float set (we use the Swiss Float). Some veterinarians utilize only a power float; however, this may result in removing too much dental surface and can also overheat the tooth and damage the pulp. We use our Swiss Float primarily to reduce single teeth that are overtly long and to help restore a contact surface that would not be restored by hand floats alone. Once we got back into the office, we neutered a male cat (quick walk-in) and a Great Pyrenees. Good way to end the day:)

Thursday, March 18, 2010

Slow day at work today...Was able to finish fencing my pasture at home for my goats...thanks to Caitlin for all her help! Tomorrow we will have a busy day. Today, looked at Gigi, the rescue dog with the oronasal fistula and the repair failed:( May see if the surgeons at UGA are willing to "donate" their expertise to repair it. It's a difficult region to repair due to the prevalence of bacteria in the mouth and the action of the tongue against the roof of the mouth. The fistula doesn't bother Gigi, but causes a snotty nose permanently...not ideal if someone were to adopt her down the road! We'll figure out what are options are next week-will have to wait 4-5 weeks before another surgery is attempted!

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:)

Tuesday, March 16, 2010

We got a new sign at the office!! Met a large, thin and hungry goat at a farm call yesterday-almost took my fingers off when I gave him some horse treats! Today, cleaned up a large hock wound on a horse-barbed wire fencing is not the ideal material for horses! We are enjoying the warmer and sunnier weather on our farms calls! It is a slow day for us at the office-not a common occurrence anymore! This gives us time to catch up on our paperwork and restock the truck.

Monday, March 15, 2010

I decided to start a blog based on our veterinary experiences in rural Georgia, as you never know what is going to walk through the door...it could be a dik-dik, an African crane, a hamster, a goat, a mastiff or a feral cat! So far, no miniature horses walking through the door...but have plenty to see out in the field! Had an interesting surgical case last week-repaired an oronasal fistula in our rescue dog, Gigi: this was a hole between the roof of the mouth and the nose, resected a proplased rectum in another rescue dog, rescued 2 thin boxers, did surgeries every day, looked at an old down cow, etc.. The beauty of being in mixed practice and having an ambulatory truck is you never know what the day is going to be like! We'll see what this week brings! Gigi seems to have recovered from her surgery quite well!