reillyshoe wrote:
agreed. the turn around time is what is looked for. farriers, vets, owners and most of all the horse.

Evaluate as many time as posible per week. It cost a lot(s) of money for care like that but that's what one pays for in a vet or clinical hospital. Praying, crossing fingers and phone calls to the horse pyschic can console. But most everyday hands on is the best.:cool:

tbloomer wrote:
I've had a few more than that go look, but, most of those don't make the changes needed.

Clint Burrell wrote:
Horses , like thier counterparts corn, they are commodities.:cool:

Jaye Perry wrote:
Corn is worth more.

Good to see ya round, How ya been? Roses doin' OK?

Laminitic Update: Well I'm batting .300 this week.

The lateral sinker is doing well, films show increase in sole depth and lateral walls much more rigid and lateral soles shows signs of becoming concave. Re-cast with rocker toe and #2 bar wedges with frog plate. Good attitude, she licked me like I was her foal.

Potomac horse dead. Got the message to cancel the next apppointment. Insurance Co and client reached agreement on pay out; bye bye horsey.

Obese pony dead. Got the message. Cost of treatment and the necessary care to be provided by the client exceeded value of pony. Wish I could be there when the bills arrive for euthanasia and burial.

why I hate laminitics...

Brian,
Sorry for the bad week- believe me, I can empathize.
Keep in mind your average can always change. The lateral sinker might be faring differently next week.

Oh great, I'm not looking forward to the possibility of going 0 for 3.

Guys,

Are these laminitics horses on your own book, or are they call ins?

Apart from mini owners who are adept at letting their ponies have a yearly episode, I might get one or two a year from my own book... if that.

Maybe because I can scare the bejezuz out of the owner before it happens? Dunno:confused:

How many cases a year do you guys handle?

Can't speak for Brian, but all of mine are call ins. I don't have a book of my own.

These last 3 were new clients, referrals from DVMs. With this economy, I've been taking new clients; really not working out well. 1 out of 10 are worth keeping, as for the rest, it's no wonder why they were looking for a new farrier.
I very rarely deal with laminitis on a regular client's horse; then it's due to a bad drug reaction, retained placenta or a very old horse.

Don't feel bad Brian, I got the same batting average this week. Two new customers that were vet referals, one went down so fast I couldn't believe it. The other was one that just kept getting worse over the last month no matter what we did. After every reset the rotation would get worse. Talked to the vet who was going to do a tenotomy and he said better to let this one go, feet were about to slough. The third was is a long time client who is feeding his horse to death, finally got him to change his feeding habits and exercise the horse more. Weight loss has been a big factor. Horse more comfortable and the white line has tightened up some over the last two sets. Hopes that continues. Sometimes I wish I had never got interested in working with these types and referred them to others, but it does make me study and think a heck of a lot. That goes along with all the headaches of course.

brian robertson wrote:

That's interesting. Like Brian I'm never faced with a laminitis case among my own clients. In fact no more than 6 or 7 in all those years. All of my laminitic cases are referals. A coincidence?


Ronald Aalders

I do get far more referrals than among my regular clients. However, I do have the occasional stubborn client who refuses to listen to my warnings of impending doom and some logical methods to circumvent it. They don't generally complain about the situation, but I have had to euthanize about 50% of these cases due to financial constraints when the outcome had a good possibility of recovery. A sad situation, but is happening more these days than in the past.

Most of my referrals have been seen by one or more previous veterinarians and they have informed the owner of the poor prognosis, so my statistics of recovery of my cases across the board is not high. Many I do wish I could have seen earlier, preferably before the event as most would have been assisted with weight control.

Rather than a farrier debating wiht an owner over feeding practices, referral to the Henneke Body Condition Scoring system may assist a lot of horses with no debate. Then the owners have a better tool to assess the real body condition of their horse and they can act on it or not as they wish. They also cannot complain about the outcome if they insist on maintaining that body condition of 8 or 9 on the chart. On occasion I feel I have seen an 11 or 12

M. W. Myers, DVM