clinical practice

• If you forget your stethoscope look under the mandible and assess the facial artery
• In the exam you will feel the digital pulse (distal to the fetlock on the palmar side), this should be difficult to feel. However, if you feel a digital pulse there is an increase in blood flow to the area which indicates that there is inflammation in the hoof (which can be caused by injury or illness).
• Palpate the coronary band, if there is a depression then this indicates inflammation and dropping of P3. then get the hoof testers out and move the horse to a softer bedding. Apply the hoof testers across the sole which is likely the site of pain.

  • If the pain doesn’t appear to be in the hoof then you may want to assess the lameness of the entire leg by applying nerve blocks
• horses with colic can be recumbent or rolling around
• With the rolling horse you want to get the horse up with a head collar and lunge rope and then restrain with detomidine and butorphanol.

  • Once sedated your clinical parameters will be altered!

  Listen on the left and right ventral aspect and the left and right as well as at the dorsal aspect (paralumbar fossa) to hear the gut sounds.

  • No gut sounds - colic

  Then perform a rectal exam.
• what does this image show?

  a heave line which indicates a high respiratory effort

  
• Horses present with mucopurulent unilateral nasal discharge when they have a tooth root abscess due to sinus involvement
• Foal hearts may have a murmur in the first dew days due to the patent ductus arteriosus hasn’t been closed. They also do not have a menace in the first few days of life.
• are the following antibiotics protected or first-line, ceftifur and enrofloxacin?

  protected
• are the following antibiotics protected or first-line, penicillin, oxytetracycline, doxycycline TMPS and gentamicin?

  first-line
• is doxycycline oral or injectable?

  oral
• is oxytetracycline injectable or oral?

  injectable
• Inappropriate use of antimicrobials includes…

  • Equine asthma (this is an inflammatory condition)
  • Foot Abscess
  • Colitis/Diarrhoea (warranted in some cases that have overwhelming sepsis)
• Equine vaccines include…

  • Equine influenza ± tetanus
  • Tetanus (on its own)
  • EHV-1,4
  • Strangles
  • Other vaccines do exist e.g., Rotavirus, EAV but these are not frequently utilized
• Tetanus is caused by clostridium tetani bacterium which is ubiquitous in soil. When a horse injures itself, the spores from the soil can penetrate the wound and, this causes irreversible toxin binding at the neuromuscular junction leading to spastic paresis. It is difficult to treat once toxin bound so prevention is better than cure
• There are two prevention methods for tetanus…

  • Toxoid Vaccine (usually combined with EI)
  • 2 x IM injections 4-6 weeks apart
  • First booster 12 months and further boosters every 2 years
  • Tetanus antitoxin IM injection following injury
  • This only provides short-term protection and is expensive
  • It can be given to neonatal foals as additional protection
• equine herpes virus EHV1,4 are the strains we are trying to vaccinate against in the UK. Respiratory disease is the most common type of herpes virus, this is endemic (affects almost horses under the age of 2) but is usually mild and the horse is only off colour (pyretic with nasal discharge) for two days. However, there can also be some more serious conditions as pregnant mares that are affected. When the respiratory disease is spread to the mare it can lead to abortion, stillbirth, and neonatal death.

  • EHV1 tends to cause abortion storms while EHV4 individual abortion only.
• There is also a neurological form of the disease which can be seen with EHV1, this is very rare but potentially fatal. This is therefore serious and can precede respiratory disease.

  • It is unknown why some horses are more predisposed to getting the neurological form of herpes than other horses. Unfortunately, the vaccines do not protect against neurological disease.
• Horses that are vaccinated include…

  • Racehorses, competition horses that travel extensively require 2 doses 4-6 weeks IM and then 6 monthly boosters.
  • Broodmares are vaccinated at 5, 7, 9 months of gestation
  • The abortion happens in the last trimester of pregnancy so this vaccine schedule prevents this
• Strep equi is taken in via the nose and then enter the pharyngeal lymphoid tissue and then it will sit in the guttural pouch. The disease seen is a snotty, purulent nasal discharge and abscessed submandibular and retropharyngeal lymph nodes (these often burst out).

  • Horses can be carriers of strangles as the disease remains in their guttural pouch. Horses often remain infectious for 4 to 6 weeks but 1 in 10 horses will continue to discharge material for longer and some can remain carriers for years (hence being the source of future outbreaks.
• Strangles prevention includes…

  • Biosecurity
  • The Equilis StrepE live vaccine
  • This is given inside of the upper lip (0.2ml) every 6m
  • Disadvantages include (abscess like) reactions and that it interferes with ELISA test (which identifies carriers). This has been taken up well by owners for these reasons but also because injected inside the upper lift is difficult.
  • The StrangVac4 (2022) recombinant protein vaccine (not live)
  • 2 x IM injections 4 weeks apart then every 6m as a booster
  • This vaccine doesn’t interfere with ELISA so is more likely to be taken up by owners
• Horses influenza antibodies fall to low levels between vaccines (this is the immune gap) and this is an individual-specific response so some horses will get a larger gap than others and hence be more vulnerable.
• horses vaccinated aginst influenza have fewer days of shedding and show fewer clinical signs so are still able to spread the virus via aerosolised spread.
• There are two forms of immunity against equine influenza, with natural being better than vaccine-induced.

  A) short

  B) short

  C) nasal

  
• In the UK there are three vaccines for equine influenza…

  • Equip F which uses an inactivated equine influenza (EI) virus
  • Equilis prequenza which uses an inactivated EI virus
  • ProteqFlu which uses the live canarypox virus expressing EI haemagglutinin

  For administration, you can look at the data sheet and the British horse association racing rules.
• to fill out an export certificate you need to undergo further training with DEFRA
• There are a variety of ethical theories such as…

  • Utilitarianism
  • Deontology (rights)
  • Virtue ethics
  • Contractarianism
  • Respect for nature
  • Relational ethics
• when filling in a passport, white lesions need to be marked in what coloured pen?


  red
• a very white head is known as a what?

  blaze
• an X on a passport indicates what?

  a whorl
• is the microchip in the left or right nuchal ligament?

  left
• unpigmented areas are demonstrated in what coloured pen?

  red
• Large white patches on piebald or skewbald horses should be hatched-in or line-shaded to differentiate them from other patches.
• Everything which is not white on the horse must be shown in black on the diagram.
• Whorls are often found on the forehead, on the crest (so be sure to check under the mane) and on the pectorals. Feathers are an extension of the whorl and this can be found on the pectorals into the base of the chest, the left and right stifles to the point of the hip (tuber coxae)
• what does this image indicate?

  a few white hairs above a median whorl

  
• what does this image indicate?

  a large ovoid star and a whorl

  
• patches, where the pigment of the skin is absent, should be described as flesh marks drawn as a red upside-down triangle. if there is a mixed border draw a border around the red triangle
• a star is any white mark on the forehead