Trade Zone - The Quest to Conquer Laminitis

"Owners and trainers worldwide have the feeling that every veterinarian and every farrier have years of experience and vast knowledge about laminitis and podiatry (foot care). Unfortunately, this is not the case," said Dr. Ric Redden, founder of the International Equine Podiatry Center in Versailles, Ky.

"Success today with laminitis is the result of the dedicated efforts of veterinarians and farriers who take it upon themselves to learn how to evaluate and treat the various stages of this complex disease," he said.

Laminitis: coming out of the dark

Italian equine podiatry specialist Dr. Lorenzo D'Arpe of the University of Padua';s Department of Clinical Sciences characterized the current state of laminitis knowledge by comparing it to the early stages of fracture evaluation and treatment. "If we think about fractures some decades ago before X-rays, vets and farriers were taking care of fractured horses with no hope, and everybody in the world knows that in that period—a fracture corresponded to euthanasia of the horse," he explained. "Today when we deal with a fracture, we clinically evaluate the horse and use X-rays, and we make a decision on...therapeutic options. It';s easy today; we can tell the owner how many days or months or years it will take to fix the horse, and if it is easy, medium, hard, or impossible.

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