Millington Equine

02/05/2025

A heads up to those of you with horses on chronic medications like Equioxx and Prascend: manufacturer price increases that happen every year are official for 2025. We have had to increase our prices accordingly with minimum retailer guidelines, so please don’t be surprised and know the price increase does not benefit us!

02/03/2025

Dr. B has had a rough stretch of winter emergencies so we wish her a relaxing and happy birthday!!

01/21/2025

Thoughtful words from a wise doctor!

When should you call the vet?
The easy answers are:
Cuts, Coughs, Colic and Clearly lame
True "come a runnin" emergencies are:
Bleeding badly, Eye problems, and difficulty Foaling
And then what? The answers become less clear if the problem is subtle or if it starts small and gets worse over weeks to months.

Call when there is
A change in performance or behavior
Training isn't progressing as you would expect

For example there could be a problem with one lead that wasn't there a few weeks ago or the horse is carrying its head higher than usual, or is getting difficult to saddle. These are clues that is a medical problem. Another time to call is when the horse has difficulty learning a simple task, for example, turning left or picking up a canter. There is a wide range of normal and some horses learn faster than others or are more athletic. But then there are those horses that fall outside of normal range. If you have been working an a basic task over and over, in many different ways and the horse just doesn't get it; it is time to call the vet.

There is a saying "If all you have is a hammer; everything you see is a nail." And it is sooo true!
Owners/riders/trainers will consider unwanted changes as a training issue or poor saddle fit or a bad day or a rider issue or a result of bad footing, the list goes on. Veterinarians will consider unwanted changes as a medical issue. Of course the answer is that it could be either or both!

Finding the root of the problem takes all of us working together for the good of the horse. If your horse is having difficulty with a basic task or there is a change in performance it is time is to
call the Vet!

01/19/2025

Dr. Berman has been in Costa Rica helping with an trip (she was meant to go to Nicaragua in 2024, but unfortunately the trip got canceled). Ask her about it when you see her next! She’ll be returning mid week with tired shoulders, a tanner face, and surely a lot of sadness about this week’s anticipated weather.

12/21/2024

Oh, what a slog December is becoming! The sunshine has been deceiving, but as the temperatures drop tonight we figured it might be a good time to review those winter colic tips. These are stolen from Rhinebeck Equine!

"Dehydration in horses is one of the primary reasons cold weather often leads to increased risk of impaction colic. The best prevention is to ensure your horses get plenty to drink, even when temperatures dip below freezing. Here are tips that can help:

1. Offer your horses free access to clean, fresh water at all times.
2. If any of your horses like to dunk their hay while eating (we don't mind this habit, which in itself increases water intake!), provide a fresh "dunking bucket" of water near their hay with every meal and a second "drinking bucket" away from where they're fed so it stays clean.
3. Use heated buckets or trough heaters to prevent horses' water sources from freezing and icing over. Horses will also consume more water if it's warm. But please make sure horses can't bite or chew on heater or extension cords.
4. Check your horses' heated water daily to ensure water isn't getting too hot or the heater isn't shorting in a way that might shock your horses and prevent them from drinking.
5. If you're using automatic waterers, check them daily to verify they're working despite the cold, which can freeze the pipes that feed the units.
6. Salt consumption will encourage horses to drink, so make sure a salt lick is always available.
7. Consider soaking your horses' daily feed rations to make a mash (but don't serve soaked rations frozen).
8. Prevent ice from building up around outdoor troughs that might keep horses from approaching for a drink. If ice does form and can't be removed, provide traction with woodchips, used bedding, or sand."

We're going to add our own: WALK ANYWAY!!

Chins up, everyone.

12/19/2024

Dr. Berman enjoyed a crisp but pretty day doing dentistry on the sanctuary thoroughbreds at who live in a big herd. They are really pretty cuddly.

12/10/2024

Dr. Berman is in Orlando for the annual AAEP Convention (yes, that thing that takes 75% of the horse vets and puts them in one place that isn't CT 🤣) learning medicine and performance techniques to bring home to all of us. She may have also snuck in a visit to Harry Potter World!

11/28/2024

Baby Rowland says happy rainy Thanksgiving from all of us to you. He hopes that you also get some ponytail with your turkey. Both doctors are hosting family so we are emergency only until Monday!

11/23/2024

It’s Dr. Trawick’s last morning of rehab class at Chi University and coincidentally the last day of teaching for esteemed teacher Dr. Carla Pasteur of Rising Sun Equine Clinic LLC. Dr. Trawick is so lucky to have had this time with one of the best horse anatomists there is!

11/14/2024

These radiographs show the same front foot of a laminitic patient before and after a single shoeing cycle in a clog. Healthier sole is growing in beneath the tip of the coffin bone, and the coffin bone's angle of rotation from the dorsal hoof wall is already normalizing. We were so pleased for this patient, and most appreciative for the farrier team that is helping Dr. Berman with the case!

11/01/2024

Friday’s best helper (and every day!)

10/21/2024

Dr. Trawick has been working this year to learn more ways of assessing and treating discomfort in our horses, because they're so much more than a stack of joints and they can't talk to us about their myofascial pain. This weekend she joined an incredible group of practitioners (and some great tiny dogs) at a Girthiness and Equipment Lameness seminar hosted by Declue Equine. We talked a lot about the "thoracic sling," necks, and the impact of tack.

Leave a comment if you're a client who would be interested in shockwave therapy!!

10/17/2024

We only just finished the 2024 breeding season, but, if you are considering breeding your mare in 2025, take advantage of this AAEP offering and register for the free webinar! Also let us know your intentions sooner rather than later, because we need to know your goals when planning next spring!

On Oct. 30, join AAEP member veterinarian and board-certified theriogenologist Dr. Dale Kelley for a one-hour webinar discussion that will cover the basics of reproductive biology of the horse, the logistics of breeding season, and what to expect when breeding your mare.

Registration is FREE but required. Attendees are also encouraged to submit their questions in advance through the registration form. A recording of the webinar will be available if you miss the live event.

Register here: https://aaep-org.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_CHkvKjmpTlGOiPMbwhEtBA #/registration

This informative session is brought to you by the AAEP Horse Owner Education Committee.

09/27/2024

This Friday’s fun was getting a horrible sub-solar abscess to drain on our friend Fish Trappe Road and then trying out our new lymphatic compression system on him. He has a recurrent cellulitis in a hind limb that he brought home from his racing days in Puerto Rico, as well as extremely damaged front fetlocks. We hope to reduce his lower limb edema over time.

09/21/2024

We are very excited to add functional electrical stimulation to our toolbox starting next week! The unit is carefully programmed to stimulate deep, symmetrical muscle contraction in horses and reduce inflammation. It will be an excellent addition for horses on rest, horses with atrophy, or just hard workers.

Like usual, W***y the steady Eddie is one of our first cases, with Dr. Trawick’s beloved Kona watching over.

08/28/2024

The loveliest Eliza is officially married! She’s not honeymooning yet so you can see her back in her normal garb immediately. We’re so happy for her 💚

05/14/2024

We can’t say we aren’t charmed by this little guy— He might be an accident, but he’ll have a fan club for life 😃🤣🥰

02/13/2024

Snow Day Podiatry Before & After:

One thing snow makes us think about is feet, because we all worry about our horses packing snow and whether they have the right pads. Then when the snow melts, we’ll be back with our constant companion Mud and worrying about moisture levels, dropped soles, and dermatitis.

The patient in the radiographs below is a 22-year-old half thoroughbred gelding, and he’s fairly representative of a common scenario we see. These horses are barefoot, have thin soles, have changes to the coffin bone, are frequently uncomfortable, and get abscesses. We’re talking about feet that look like this for years, not horses that have just been made barefoot with some hope that in time they will “toughen up.” These horses commonly have a potentially small space that has been used long enough that there are some drainage problems--and you all know if Mud is only in two corners that’s where the horse will spend 80% of its time. These are horses for whom the real concern is an ability to be pasture sound, with riding soundness being either irrelevant or in a distant future.

We’ve been exploring what we can do for these horses within realistic parameters to get them to a better place for their hoof care team.

Do you put on a shoe for protection?

Sure, but many of these horses are barefoot because 1. They can’t hold nails consistently or 2. They don’t live in a location a farrier is willing to come to for one horse. We know the demand for qualified farriers scarcely meets the need these days, and it doesn’t make economic sense for them to drive to every single or two-horse home.

Do you cast it? That might help over time. It will likely take an awfully long time for that to allow enough sole development to get ahead of the negative cycle. These are feet that seem to grow almost entirely outward instead of up-and-down and change is sloowww.

You can put on a shoe with a heart bar or a frog support pad, you can keep trying to move the breakover back, but when feet are THIS far gone it usually takes a big effort and some mechanics to get ahead. That can mean a shoe with rocker motion. That can mean a clog nailed on. In this case we tried out a cuff called a Nanric Ultimate that was developed by Dr. Ric Redden and is a favorite in the horsey land of Kentucky. It can be bandaged on or glued on. It can be used to help increase blood supply to the foot and speed up sole growth.

*pause—we know these radiographs aren’t the straightest but we don’t care because they still show change*

This patient was three-legged lame much of the time. He had 0 to 5 mm of sole because abscesses had resulted in some parts of the sole entirely peeling away. These before and afters are 15 weeks apart. For 15 weeks a very diligent owner monitored and replaced the cuffs with multiple farm calls for status checks. In fifteen weeks this horse doubled his sole depth and has been consistently comfortable in his daily activities. Now he has enough foot for his trimmer to work with, and we think that’s pretty cool!