Connaught House Vets - Equine

27/06/2024

🤩 THANK YOU 🤩

To all of our clients for getting us on the Shortlist for BestUKVets 🙏

This is based on all 4 and 5 star reviews that you have left for us, which shows that every review really does matter!

We are so pleased to be shortlisted this year, who knows, next year could be our year!

26/06/2024

🤩 NOTICE TO OUR CLIENTS 🤩

Exciting changes are ahead for us behind the scenes as we change from a ‘Partnership’ to a Limited Company.

Rest assured, nothing changes for you as our customer, and all our services will remain the same whilst we continue to provide the best care for your four-legged friends. We are NOT selling to a corporate company; your pets will continue to receive bespoke veterinary care that can only be provided by a proudly independent practice.

The only changes you will notice are a change of name from Connaught House Veterinary Hospital to Connaught House Veterinary Group and updated bank account details.

This change will be complete on the 1st July 2024 so:
📌 any bank transfers to the old account must END on 28th June 2024 and payments made to the new account from 1st July 2024.

We would like to take this opportunity to thank you for your continued support of our Veterinary Group, we appreciate all your custom and are honoured that you choose us to take care of your pets.

Best Regards

Connaught House Veterinary Team 🐴🐶🐱

Please note, pet health plan direct debits are unaffected by changes so you do not need to do anything.

26/06/2024

When your bestie won't share his dinner so you have to take matters into your own hands...

Does anyone remember that Friends episode 'JOEY DOESN'T SHARE FOOD'?! 🤣

25/06/2024

Dr Lucky is just giving Ernie a once over before all of the sun shine today 🌞🥰🐶🐴

Does your yard have it's very own resident equine vet too? We would love to see some photos!

18/06/2024

A really interesting post from How To Dressage on true relaxation of a horse when you are riding (not just dressage!).

Does anyone have any tips to share on how they keep their horse relaxed? Or how can you tell when yours relaxes?

I am lucky enough to have a horse that lets his ears flop when he’s feeling good, very satisfying to watch when you are riding!

IDENTIFYING RELAXATION UNDER SADDLE

If you have achieved relaxation while riding your horse, you should experience the following:

✅ Your horse will willingly accept your aid and respond with his whole body.
✅ Your horse will move rhythmically, with a supple and swinging back.
✅ Your horse's breathing will be rhythmical.
✅ You will be able to bend your horse easily and uniformly through his whole body from side to side.
✅ Your horse's ears will be relaxed and hang to the side, occasionally flicking back and forth as he attends to what he's doing.
✅ Your horse's eyes will be bright and alert but not show any whites.
✅ When you allow your horse to stretch, he will extend his neck forward and down (not lift his head straight up in the air).

Your horse must be relaxed to receive, accept, and respond to your aids. Without relaxation, you cannot influence your horse; instead, you become a passenger on a horse whose attention is focused outward.

Stock image from Shutterstock.

Check out our latest book on Amazon
UK - https://amzn.to/4b7hwLf
US - https://amzn.to/3ybENgq

01/06/2024

OUR TELEPHONES ARE NOT WORKING PROPERLY !! Every effort is being made to sort this out, but in the meantime please call 07791959480, this is reception,
Or 07967823444
This is Andrew’s no, and he may be busy, so please try the other line first and only call this if you are struggling to get them.
Apologies!!!

22/05/2024

What would you add to this list?

Just popping to the yard and genuine reasons for selling... are these some of the most overused phrases in the horse world?

Read more via link below

20/05/2024

🐴 G A S T R I C H E A L T H 🐴

Pectigus ADVANCED gastric support formula to assist with maintaining optimum gut function and health.

This mineral feed for horses supports normal digestive tract function and is:

📍Suitable for all horses & foals
📍Ideal for horses during intense training, competition or rehabilitation
📍Promotes healthy digestion & absorption of nutrients in feed
📍Suitable for short & long term use
📍Competition Safe (UK)
📍Squamous and glandular Gastric support

PectigusADVANCED contains:

🐴Calcium Carbonate & Magnesium Hydroxide – alkaline buffers to support the elevation of gastric PH.
🐴Pectizone® – a scientific blend of Pectin, Lecithin and Fructo-oligosaccharides (FOS) prebiotics. Pectin acts with lecithin to form a hydrophobic barrier on the gastric mucosal membranes, assisting in reducing the impact of gastric acid in the glandular section of the horses stomach. FOS assists with stimulating good bacteria and supporting intestinal efficiency.
🐴Sodium Alginate forms a gelatinous barrier to reduce the impact of acidic stomach contents on the non-glandular section of the stomach.
🐴Amino Acid – Glutamine Peptides is a bonded and highly absorbable amino acid which aids the production of intestinal epithelial cells, supports optimal intestinal performance and is essential in the repair and production of epithelial cells.
🐴Amino Acid – Threonine aids intestinal mucin synthesis and gut barrier function.

Priced at £116.80 for a 60 day supply at maintenance dose.

17/05/2024

🏇 Researchers from the RVC are calling for owners and previous owners of former racehorses in the UK to participate in a new survey and share their experiences of rehoming racehorses to uncover the different factors that influence a successful outcome.

➡️ Read more: https://rvc.uk.com/life-after-racing
📝 Take the survey at: https://app.onlinesurveys.jisc.ac.uk/s/rvc/racehorse-rehoming-survey

15/05/2024

🪰 F L I E S 🪰

With all the wet weather, followed by sun, followed by more wet the flies are rife already this year!

Our top tips to fight the flies are:
🪰 Use fly rugs and masks
🪰 Fly repellents, or the repellent tags attached to a headcollar
🪰 Bring into a stable in the day, and turn out during the night (avoid the peak times of dawn & dusk)
🪰 Position your muck heap as far away from the horses, and the stables, as possible.

Do you have any home remedies that work? Or swear by a particular product to keep the flies at bay?

14/05/2024

🥳Connaught House Equine Gastroscope Clinics🥳

WEDNESDAY 29th May we have spaces on our gastroscope clinic; have your horses sedated and scoped for the heavily discounted price of £180.00.

If you would like to book onto the gastroscope clinics or have any questions please contact the practice 01902 424725.

🐎EGUS (Equine Gastric Ulcer Syndrome) is diagnosed using gastroscopy – the passing of a camera into the horse’s stomach.
🐎EGUS was often thought to be a condition seen primarily in racehorses but is now diagnosed in many other breeds and types of horse and pony.
Signs of EGUS include:
🐎Change in general behaviour
🐎Nipping or face pulling when girthed up, putting on rugs or grooming
🐎Recurrent colic
🐎Becoming picky with food
🐎Weight loss
🐎Unwilling to go forward when ridden and poor performance

07/05/2024

Strangles Awareness Week competition brought to you by Redwings Horse Sanctuary.

02/05/2024

🪱 WORMING TESTS 🪱

Testing your horse and pony before administering wormers is vitally important to tackle the growing problem of resistance and to identify the equines that do and do not require worming.

Faecal worm egg counts (FWEC):

🪱 Take pinches of faeces from different areas of a fresh dropping and place in the air tight container provided. Ideally the sample should be collected and posted straight away. If this is not possible the store in a fridge.
🪱 The airtight container and refrigeration prevent eggs hatching in the sample which would mean a false result as the eggs then cannot be counted.
🪱 Only estimates the amount of egg laying adults in the horse not the immature stages.
🪱 FWEC does not show encysted redworm, tapeworm, pin worm or bots.

Tapeworm saliva test:

🪱 Analyses specific antibodies in saliva to determine if there is a tapeworm burden.
🪱 A swab is placed in the horses mouth which will change colour and is then sent to the laboratory for analysis. Ensure the horse has not eaten for 30 minutes prior as this can invalidate results.

Testing protocol for a healthy horse:

🪱WEC – Every 8-12 weeks
🪱Tapeworm saliva test – Every 6 months spring and autumn/early winter
🪱Red worm blood test – Once a year September to December or January to April if missed
🪱Worm with required product only if needed!

If you have any worming questions please feel free to contact the practice.

23/04/2024

In a celebration to the versatility of racehorses after Aintree last week, we thought we would share one of our employees success stories.

Kate (who is usually writes these Facebook posts but who is too modest to be trusted with this one 😂) and one of her three ex racehorses, Gullible Gordon, qualified and competed at the two day ROR Dressage Winter Championships in Leicestershire at the weekend.

On the first day Gordon and Kate gained 3rd in their warm up class and 5th in the Championship class. The second day they were 6th in their warm up and an amazing 2nd in their Championship test and gained personal best scores in both!

Just to make this achievement even greater both only started doing dressage in February this year! With Gordon previously turning his hooves to team chasing and hunting but will also making his eventing debut this year at the grand old age of 21.

A HUGE congratulations to Kate and Gordon for their hard work which has more than paid off with these fantastic results!

ROR do a wonderful job of celebrating former racehorses, with a huge range of activities covered in both affiliated and unaffiliated competitions. If you own a racehorse and haven’t looked - then it is well worth getting involved.

We would LOVE to see photos of you & your ex racehorses enjoying what you love too.

15/04/2024

What one horsey photo from the weekend makes you smile?

Here's Jeannot & Gordon waiting for a clinic, both on the edge of their seats with excitement as you can see!

13/04/2024

Sue & Lucy at The National.

All home safe with no serious injuries in the big race 🐎👏🏻

12/04/2024

𝗙𝗿𝗶𝗱𝗮𝘆 𝗙𝗮𝗰𝘁 - 𝗠𝘂𝘀𝗰𝗹𝗲𝘀

Muscles control every aspect of movement - both internal and external. They form the largest tissue mass in the horse's body.

There are various types of muscles performing a wide variety of tasks all working in a similar way. Electrical impulses instruct the fibres to contract and shorten, then relax and lengthen.

There are 3 types of muscle:
𝟭. 𝗦𝗺𝗼𝗼𝘁𝗵 𝗺𝘂𝘀𝗰𝗹𝗲 - This is an involuntary muscle which functions automatically. It surrounds and is found in all internal tissues and organs. Smooth muscle responds to stimuli from the autonomic nervous system. It is responsible for pushing food through the digestive system and for the physical control of the bladder and bowel. It is also found in the vascualr and reproductive systems.

𝟮. 𝗖𝗮𝗿𝗱𝗶𝗮𝗰 𝗺𝘂𝘀𝗰𝗹𝗲 - A highly specialised, strong, thick muscle that is fatigue resistant. Beating around 100,000 times a day throughout the horse's lifetime. This muscle co-ordinates the propulsion of blood in and out of the heart.

𝟯. 𝗦𝗸𝗲𝗹𝗲𝘁𝗮𝗹 𝗺𝘂𝘀𝗰𝗹𝗲 - There are over 700 different skeletal muscles in the horse. The brain sends a signal to the muscles via nerves which then convert chemical energy into movement.
The function of skeletal muscle is to:
🐎 Support the skeleton and create movement
🐎 Maintain joint stability and posture
🐎 Control range of movement
🐎 Protect the skeleton and internal organs from trauma
🐎 Contribute to thermoregulation by shivering

11/04/2024

Sue is there as a course vet with our Equine RVN Lucy!

11/04/2024

😆 Not something I ever thought I would see!

“The chances of a horse boarding your train are low, but never zero..."

Read more via link below

20/03/2024

😀 I N T E R N A T I O N A L D A Y O F H A P P I N E S S 😀

We would LOVE to hear what makes your horses happy and, in turn, makes you happy?!

13/03/2024

⚠️ L A S E R T H E R A P Y ⚠️

Bertie, a former racehorse, had become tense and resistant in his dressage work with a reluctance to go forward and unwillingness to work over his back so Sue was called out to go and have a look.

Sue found soreness in both sides of his lumbar area of his back behind the saddle, with a marked reaction seen on palpation of the area which was sore and in spasm. This could be because his owner had upped his schooling work so he was working over his back more, or he had had a slip in the trailer at the start of the year, or he had also been to the gallops so could of tweaked something - or a combination of all three (we love horses, we love horses)!

Sue recommended some stretches, backing up, long reining up hills and also some therapeutic laser treatment to aid recovery of the muscles.

Lucy, our Equine RVN, then started laser treatments and show Bertie's owner how to perform the stretches correctly (and with a source of fibre such as alpha-a rather than treats!). These stretches help to build up muscle without the weight of a rider on top.

Therapeutic laser was also performed to the area over a 2 week period to help to aid recovery of the muscles.

Bertie's muscles have made a good recovery, he has finished his laser therapy and is carrying on with ground work for another month to keep strengthen and conditioning before returning to full work gradually.

08/03/2024

🦸‍♀️International Women’s Day 🚺

What better day to highlight our Senior Partner Sue Taylor?!

Sue is the epitome of strong, independent woman as I am sure you will all agree but also caring, compassionate and has thrived throughout her life in her endeavours.

Let’s take this day to celebrate every single woman, BUT especially those that battle through all weathers to make sure their four legged babies are warm, dry and well fed (unlike us who are soaked, bedraggled and freezing COLD 🥶!!)

08/03/2024

‼️ Phone Update ‼️

We are so terribly sorry for any problems you may have had reaching us over the last couple of weeks, we still have ongoing issues with our telephone system.

After having a BT engineer, and an engineer from our phone company, we are now awaiting a new router and another engineer to come out to try and solve this.

This means we are expecting more problems over the coming days until this arrives with us.

If you are having trouble getting through:

‼️ EMERGENCIES - Please call Kingswinford on 01384295949
‼️ OUT OF HOURS EMERGENCIES - VetsNow on 01952324381

Non Urgent Enquiries -
📌 Please Whatsapp us on +447360544169
📌 Email - [email protected]

We really do appreciate your understanding in this matter - we know it is stressful (as we feel it too!) to not be able to get hold of us, but please know we are doing the best we can.

Thank you so much
The Connaught Team
🐶🐱🐰🐴

04/03/2024

G A S T R O S C O P E C L I N I C S

We are still offering our monthly (heavily discounted!) gastroscope clinics at Connaught Vets Equine Clinic in Burnhill Green.

Please contact us for more information, or to book in.

We do have limited stabling for those wishing to stay the night before for starvation purposes.

29/02/2024

THURSDAY 29th FEBRUARY

‼️ A T T E N T I O N ‼️

Our phone lines and computer systems are currently DOWN at the hospital.

Any non urgent queries please wait for another update before calling, or use our WhatsApp to get in contact.

Emergencies please call our Kingswinford branch and we can go from there - 01384295949

We are working to fix this ASAP so please bear with us.

26/02/2024

MONDAY 26th FEBRUARY

23/02/2024

‼️ A T T E N T I O N ‼️

Our phone lines and computer systems are currently DOWN at the hospital.

Any non urgent queries please wait for another update before calling, or use our WhatsApp to get in contact.

Emergencies please call our Kingswinford branch and we can go from there - 01384295949

We are working to fix this ASAP so please bear with us.

14/02/2024

Happy Valentine's Day to all of our beautiful four legged clients, both thoroughbred and non-thoroughbred!
❤️🌹

🌹 Happy Valentine's Day to the amazing RoR community! 🌟

Spread the love by sharing a snapshot below, capturing the special bond between you and your former racehorse. ❤️ Don't forget to use

📸 Courtesy of Bethany Grace Photography