Cornell team develops horse anatomy app for studentsMay 9, 2019An app created by a team from Cornell University's College of Veterinary Medicine (CVM) is helping students learn and understand the anatomy of a horse. According to the Cornell Chronicle, the Equine X-Ray Positioning Simulator is an augmented reality app that overlays a digital image of a horse limb onto surroundings seen through an iPad. The app was first used in the spring during CVM's eight-week Anatomy of the Horse course. Allison Miller, DVM, lecturer in the department of biomedical sciences and the department of clinical sciences, helped create the app to allow students to study parts of the equine musculoskeletal system. "We try really hard not to teach anatomy as memorization," Dr. Miller told the news source. According to the same article, Miller had students complete exercises such as dragging and dropping bone labels onto parts of a horse's body. "Students can hear a lecture on how to take certain oblique radiographic views, but actually positioning yourself to take them might prove more challenging," Miller told the Cornell Chronicle. "While nothing can fully prepare you for an emergency where you have primary case responsibility and emotions are running high, I think we are doing our absolute best to prepare …
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Obesity: A threat that can be prevented easilyMay 7, 2019It would be interesting to see what a survey of equine horse owners and caregivers might think is the biggest threat to equine health. Colic might be high on the list, so would respiratory disease and arthritis. However, perhaps overlooked—at least in horse owner circles—is a very important and sometimes-even-thought-to-be desirable condition: obesity. Over the years, numerous studies on obesity in horses have been conducted in the U.S. and elsewhere. The problem, like the horses, appears to be growing. According to a recent report by the British Equine Veterinary Association (BEVA), obesity is the biggest threat to equine health. In the U.K., hundreds of horses are put down every year as a result of obesity-related health problems. The roots of the problem The causes of obesity are well understood. Feral horses thrive under conditions where they move continuously—25 to 50 mi. per day—while eating frequent, small meals of relatively poor-quality forage. (Wild horses are observed to eat virtually every hour, around the clock.) Domestication has changed almost everything about how horses live. For example: Most domesticated horses are confined, at least to some extent, limiting the distances they can travel. When they are exercised, often it is for short …
Equine asthma treatment study underwayApril 22, 2019Having already invented a means of diagnosing equine asthma, a professor at Purdue's College of Veterinary Medicine is focusing his attention on treating horses with the condition. Laurent Couëtil, DVM, PhD, professor of large animal internal medicine, director of Purdue University's Equine Sports Medicine Center, has spent majority of his career treating and researching equine asthma. "Milder equine asthma has been difficult to detect because horses don't necessarily show many signs besides the fact they're not performing well," says Dr. Couëtil. "Some of them cough once in a while, but it isn't crippling them. Now that we have the tools to look for it, we realize it's very common." "In humans, the most common test performed to test for asthma is forced exhalation. The nurse trains you to take in the deepest breath possible and blow out as hard as you can. This is easy for people because we can follow instructions, but you can't tell a horse to do that, so I worked with Purdue engineers to develop a pulmonary function test for horses." Corticosteroids are typically used to treat equine asthma; however, they come with a risk of drug violations in racehorses, suppress the horse's immune system, and …
Understanding equine infectious anemiaApril 17, 2019In January, four horses in Rutherford County, Tenn., were euthanized after contracting equine infectious anemia (EIA). Six other horses were quarantined after an initial negative test, pending a second test. Such incidents highlight the reasons equine veterinarians should be vigilant in their surveillance for this incurable viral disease. In fact, in 2017, 80 EIA-positive horses were identified in the U.S., with 38 premises testing positive for the disease (Figure 1). What is equine infectious anemia? EIA is a viral disease affecting only members of the equidae family (horses, ponies, zebras, mules, and donkeys). It is caused by an RNA virus from the Lentivirus, a genus of Retroviridae. EIA remains an uncommon, albeit persistent problem both in this country and abroad. While EIA is not a direct threat to human health, it is a reportable disease in all the U.S. How is the disease transmitted? The most important mode of transmission of EIA is via blood-feeding insects, especially biting flies such as horse flies, deer flies, and, possibly, stable flies. Horses may react strongly to biting flies; their defensive behaviors can interrupt feeding by the insect. This makes the flies particularly efficient transmitters of EIA because when a horse reacts, …
UF studies anesthetic with potential for misuse in racehorsesApril 16, 2019A local anesthetic with the potential for misuse in racehorses is being studied by veterinarians at the University of Florida (UF) College of Veterinary Medicine in collaboration with UF Racing Laboratory. The study will observe bupivacaine as there are concerns the extended release form of the drug could be used unethically to mask pain or an injury in a racehorse. "Bupivacaine has been around for a while," says Taralyn McCarrel, DVM, an equine surgeon and the grant's principal investigator. "We don't use it a lot, as most of the time we're doing very short procedures and for those, we tend to use drugs that are shorter-acting. This is true also when we're using them in a lameness examination. We only need the drugs to last a few hours in most cases." "In this new formulation, tiny droplets of bupivacaine are wrapped in a membrane, which is the liposomal component. After injection, the liposomes start to break down, and gradually release these small pockets of drug over a long time." The research team will start by determining the minimal effective dose to block pain in a horse's foot and to assess how long the anesthetic effect lasts. They will then …
Diagnosing and preventing West Nile virusMarch 26, 2019Although it does not dominate the equine health headlines in the same manner it did nearly two decades ago, West Nile virus (WNV) is an ever-present threat, and one about which veterinarians should remind horse owners to be vigilant. For example, last year, health officials confirmed 31 cases of WNV in Ohio, which was more than twice as many cases than in 2017. Even in California, with its arid climate, approximately 20 cases per year have been reported since 2009. What is West Nile virus? Isolated in Uganda in 1937, West Nile virus was first detected stateside in 1999 in the New York City area. WNV is a member of the flavivirus genus and belongs to the Japanese encephalitis antigenic complex of the family Flaviviridae. After its introduction, the virus subsequently spread throughout the U.S. and Canada via mosquitoes, infecting birds, humans, horses, and other animals in the process. The virus's morbidity is perhaps unappreciated; as of 2015, more than 27,000 horses in the U.S. have been infected since the disease was first identified. WNV also is the leading cause of mosquito-borne disease in the continental U.S. WNV virus is maintained in the wild bird population and spread between …
Boehringer Ingelheim, GNA Biosolutions to develop ASF rapid diagnostic toolFebruary 27, 2019Veterinarians, farmers, and the food-producing industry may soon have a new tool to help diagnose and stop the worldwide spread of African swine fever (ASF). Boehringer Ingelheim and GNA Biosolutions are partnering up to develop a rapid ASF diagnostic test that would be used in combination with GNA's portable molecular diagnostic platform. "This partnership represents another example of our focus on prevention and our continuous effort to control swine diseases," said Alain Wille, DVM, head of global business unit swine at Boehringer Ingelheim. ASF is a devastating viral infection of swine causing severe clinical disease and high mortality. The disease is untreatable and no effective vaccines are currently available. ASF does not affect humans. The disease could potentially jeopardize many countries' pig trade and supplies. Recent outbreaks of the ASF in China have resulted in more than 600,000 pigs being culled within the past few months. "We are delighted to enter this collaboration with Boehringer Ingelheim, a global leader in animal health," said GNA Biosolutions cofounder and managing director, Lars Ullerich, PhD. "This collaboration further emphasizes the role of GNA Biosolutions in the rapidly developing field of extra-laboratory diagnostics and extends the application of our pulse-controlled amplification (PCA) technology into …
Vitamin E: Necessary to horses, but there's a lot to learnFebruary 5, 2019Vitamin E seems to be at the forefront of many discussions about horse nutrition these days. Contrary to appearances, vitamin E is not a vitamin in and of itself. Rather, it's a group of eight compounds—four tocopherols and four tocotrienols—that are fat soluble. This vitamin is important for myriad functions in the horse's body, including but not limited to, and in no particular order, the eyes, the reproductive tract, and the neuromuscular system. The most important function of vitamin E seems to be as a biological antioxidant. In this way, and probably by other ways that haven't been determined yet, vitamin E serves to maintain many normal body functions of the horse. Vitamin E-related problems generally manifest in the horse's neuromuscular system. In young horses, these include nutritional myodegeneration, neuroaxonal dystrophy, and equine degenerative myeloencephalopathy; in older horses, a lack of vitamin E is associated with vitamin E-deficient muscle problems or equine motor neuron disease. The grass is greener and packed with vitamin E Happily, for most horses, there is ample vitamin E provided in the diet. Green grass is a great source of vitamin E—most things that are green have a good bit of it. Those horses lucky …
A readily available, inexpensive, and scientifically sound wound lavage systemJanuary 21, 2019There are many undeniable advantages to using a garden hose for wound lavage.
Merck Animal Health and Alopexx develop pneumonia vaccine for foalsJanuary 18, 2019Two companies have come together to develop a vaccine for infections in young horses.
