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I was thinking last night about happy endings. They're bullshit. There are no happy endings.
( Aren't YOU just a ray of sunshine!! )
( Aren't YOU just a ray of sunshine!! )
Less-good horse updates
Feb. 6th, 2019 07:34 amPatapsco responded well to the antibiotics. Sinus-type infection improved rapidly, breathing cleared up.
( That's the end of the good news. )
( That's the end of the good news. )I got my registration papers for Patapsco today and she's even still alive, so that's a win. What's slightly less of a win is the other information I can get from the registration papers...
( Why can't you ever be happy? )
( Why can't you ever be happy? )(no subject)
Dec. 19th, 2018 06:31 pmFarrier today for the boys. They were fine. Farrier complimented Bird's feet. Also the long-awaited genetic test stuff for Patapsco's registration finally came in the mail AND she's even still alive. Yay. So, after work I went over to Trys's house to rip hair out of her mane for the genetic test kit. She's a lot bigger from when I saw her last and has put back on a bunch of the weight she lost while sick.
(no subject)
Nov. 5th, 2018 06:55 am*sigh* Trys called the vet again about the oxytet. That, you recall, is the kidney-toxic oxytet that has to be given IV and has to be diluted and has to be dribbled into the baby horse over a fairly beefy timeframe for five days in a row on a patient who is quite a bit leery of needle sticks. The vet says “Do The Oxytet Or Baby Horse Will Go Blind In All Her Eyes Plus Also These Numerous Other Equine Vets Who Have Been Briefed On The Curious Case Of The Baby Horse Agree With Me. And also, it’s your baby horse, you do what you want.”
So, okay. You’re the vet. I hope to hell we can get the damn stuff in her. She is not a compliant patient. We might get a day or two. We are not going to get five days, I don’t think. I foresee another farm call and another iv catheter installed in my future.
Money, I didn’t like having it anyway.
So, okay. You’re the vet. I hope to hell we can get the damn stuff in her. She is not a compliant patient. We might get a day or two. We are not going to get five days, I don’t think. I foresee another farm call and another iv catheter installed in my future.
Money, I didn’t like having it anyway.
(no subject)
Nov. 3rd, 2018 12:22 pmBaby horse update: Still have a baby horse, more or less. Vet sent off bloodwork to Penn State to check for Lepto and that came back today. Baby horse apparently is “infected” with three different strains of lepto and has “the highest titer he’s ever seen in any species” for pig lepto whatever the fuck that is. I note with interest that the Merck Vet Manual says the following: ‘Acute Pomona infections also commonly cause cross-reacting antibodies for Bratislava and Icterohaemorrhagiae on the MAT, which may explain some of the commonly observed high titers to Bratislava.’ so maybe that’s why baby horse comes up roses for three flavors of Lepto.
Fuck my life.
Anyway vet says we need to do five IV doses of Oxytetracycline 200LA which is gonna be super fun given that this baby horse has had so many needle sticks in the last month that she has decided, with good cause, that she doesn’t fucking want to be needle-stuck any goddamn more, thank you very much. Not sure how that’s gonna go for five days and allegedly it should be diluted, as well. Ugh. Oxytet is the antibiotic of choice for Lepto pomona, though, so probably it’s the right drug.
Internet suggests that oxytetracycline should not be given to ponies with kidney problems. Guess whose pony had kidney problems TWO WEEKS AGO? Vet says this should not be a problem. Hunh. Okay. He’s the vet. I am not the vet.
However, I am a thousand dollars into the medical bill hole of woe for this fucking baby horse. (Not counting blood work, which is another $300 or so.) At this point I am not going to kill this damn baby horse from lack of attention to details. I know it’s wrong and bad and not-trusting-the-vet but I am googling the shit out of things so that maybe I can prevent killing this fucking baby horse who is the last thing I have left out of my dead mare.
Vet says “5mg of drug for each 10lb of baby horse” which is good. That’s roughly 5mg per Kg of baby horse. 10 lb is 4.5 kg of baby horse and this dosage rate appears to be within the dosage range for equines for IV oxytetLA200. (I’m getting the upper dosage for equines from this site which suggests 10mg/kg of equine.) Vet continued, saying give “9 or 10 cc of OxytetLA 200, once daily″ which doesn’t work out to me as meeting the 10mg/kg dosage guideline OR falling in line with the “5 mg of drug for each 10 lb of baby horse”. It looks like a lot more than that.
Let me explain.
Oxytetracycline LA200, per the website here, says it contains “200 mg oxytetracycline per ml” and I recall from high school chemistry that a mL and a cc are the fucking same thing. So this stuff is 200 mg per 1 cc. It’s got 200 mg of active ingredient per 1 cc of injectable fluid. That’s right there on the lable.
Referring to vet’s instructions, a 9 or 10 cc shot means, like, 9 x 200mg of actual ingredient. 9 x 200mg is 1800 mg of Oxytetracycline LA200′s active ingredient. At 5 mg of actual medicine per 10 lb of baby horse, for a baby horse that weighs 200 lbs on a good day… we should be giving 100 mg of actual medicine, not 1800 mg. 1800 is way too much.
I mean, my math isn’t fucked up. I am pretty sure my math isn’t fucked up.
Vet said to give 5 mg per 10 lb of baby horse. Baby horse weighs 200 lb approximately. Divide by 10 and we get 20 for how many sets of 10 lbs are in a 200 lb baby. So, multiply 20 by 5 and you get 100 mg of active ingredient dose, which (according to the 200mg/cc thing) is half a fucking cc of the stuff… not like nine or ten cc’s.
Maybe vet meant 5 mg per kg of baby horse. Baby horse weighs about 90 kg. So, 90 x 5 = 450 mg. That’s two and a bit cc’s, not nine or ten.
The internet (people labeled DVM and sites like Merck Veterinary Manual and such because I am not a fucking idiot and I don’t care what ya’ll on the CotH website did) allows as how you could maybe do as high as 10mg per kg of baby horse. That seems a bit high, but okay. Baby horse weighs 90 kg, give or take, so that’s 900 mg, which works out to 4.5 cc of the stuff at a 200 mg/cc concentration… HALF AS MUCH as the vet is suggesting with the “9 or 10 cc’s” amount.
There is no way on earth that 9 to 10 cc’s of LA200 is correct for this foal. I’m going to have Trys call the vet for a better explanation of what to do.
Fuck my life.
Anyway vet says we need to do five IV doses of Oxytetracycline 200LA which is gonna be super fun given that this baby horse has had so many needle sticks in the last month that she has decided, with good cause, that she doesn’t fucking want to be needle-stuck any goddamn more, thank you very much. Not sure how that’s gonna go for five days and allegedly it should be diluted, as well. Ugh. Oxytet is the antibiotic of choice for Lepto pomona, though, so probably it’s the right drug.
Internet suggests that oxytetracycline should not be given to ponies with kidney problems. Guess whose pony had kidney problems TWO WEEKS AGO? Vet says this should not be a problem. Hunh. Okay. He’s the vet. I am not the vet.
However, I am a thousand dollars into the medical bill hole of woe for this fucking baby horse. (Not counting blood work, which is another $300 or so.) At this point I am not going to kill this damn baby horse from lack of attention to details. I know it’s wrong and bad and not-trusting-the-vet but I am googling the shit out of things so that maybe I can prevent killing this fucking baby horse who is the last thing I have left out of my dead mare.
Vet says “5mg of drug for each 10lb of baby horse” which is good. That’s roughly 5mg per Kg of baby horse. 10 lb is 4.5 kg of baby horse and this dosage rate appears to be within the dosage range for equines for IV oxytetLA200. (I’m getting the upper dosage for equines from this site which suggests 10mg/kg of equine.) Vet continued, saying give “9 or 10 cc of OxytetLA 200, once daily″ which doesn’t work out to me as meeting the 10mg/kg dosage guideline OR falling in line with the “5 mg of drug for each 10 lb of baby horse”. It looks like a lot more than that.
Let me explain.
Oxytetracycline LA200, per the website here, says it contains “200 mg oxytetracycline per ml” and I recall from high school chemistry that a mL and a cc are the fucking same thing. So this stuff is 200 mg per 1 cc. It’s got 200 mg of active ingredient per 1 cc of injectable fluid. That’s right there on the lable.
Referring to vet’s instructions, a 9 or 10 cc shot means, like, 9 x 200mg of actual ingredient. 9 x 200mg is 1800 mg of Oxytetracycline LA200′s active ingredient. At 5 mg of actual medicine per 10 lb of baby horse, for a baby horse that weighs 200 lbs on a good day… we should be giving 100 mg of actual medicine, not 1800 mg. 1800 is way too much.
I mean, my math isn’t fucked up. I am pretty sure my math isn’t fucked up.
Vet said to give 5 mg per 10 lb of baby horse. Baby horse weighs 200 lb approximately. Divide by 10 and we get 20 for how many sets of 10 lbs are in a 200 lb baby. So, multiply 20 by 5 and you get 100 mg of active ingredient dose, which (according to the 200mg/cc thing) is half a fucking cc of the stuff… not like nine or ten cc’s.
Maybe vet meant 5 mg per kg of baby horse. Baby horse weighs about 90 kg. So, 90 x 5 = 450 mg. That’s two and a bit cc’s, not nine or ten.
The internet (people labeled DVM and sites like Merck Veterinary Manual and such because I am not a fucking idiot and I don’t care what ya’ll on the CotH website did) allows as how you could maybe do as high as 10mg per kg of baby horse. That seems a bit high, but okay. Baby horse weighs 90 kg, give or take, so that’s 900 mg, which works out to 4.5 cc of the stuff at a 200 mg/cc concentration… HALF AS MUCH as the vet is suggesting with the “9 or 10 cc’s” amount.
There is no way on earth that 9 to 10 cc’s of LA200 is correct for this foal. I’m going to have Trys call the vet for a better explanation of what to do.
(no subject)
Nov. 3rd, 2018 12:21 pmBaby horse had a seizure following injection of polyflex (we think) this evening. Hopped right up afterward and ditty-bopped out like she was just fine. No clue. Wtf, baby horse. Either get better or die.
We put her outside b/c there is less stuff for her to kill herself on in the field than in the barn if she seizes more. If she’s not dead in the morning, we’ll look into it further.
We put her outside b/c there is less stuff for her to kill herself on in the field than in the barn if she seizes more. If she’s not dead in the morning, we’ll look into it further.
(no subject)
Oct. 30th, 2018 12:26 pmI still have a baby horse. Patapsco has functioning kidneys. Actually, they’re working just fine, though she is going to have to go through life with no further kidney-toxic meds. No bute, no banamine, nothing. We still have to run a WBC and see about any lingering infections. Not sure if she has lepto or not, not sure what antibiotics to give her, so we are by no means out of the woods. However, she has functioning kidneys – BUN and CRE look good after 4 days with no IV fluids.
BUN is 25.9 (recall, we started at >140) which is just over “normal” at 25.
Cre is 0.8 (recall, we started at 11), which is more-or-less normal (.7 to 1.8).
Vet is “cautiously hopeful” and gives pony a 70% shot at making it.
We are pretty sure she’s blind in the left eye.
BUN is 25.9 (recall, we started at >140) which is just over “normal” at 25.
Cre is 0.8 (recall, we started at 11), which is more-or-less normal (.7 to 1.8).
Vet is “cautiously hopeful” and gives pony a 70% shot at making it.
We are pretty sure she’s blind in the left eye.
(no subject)
Oct. 25th, 2018 06:58 amBaby horse is alert, oriented, willing to trot away from me (I had a flashlight in my hand when I touched her is why), and chowing down on her kibble and hay with enthusiasm.
She is not dehydrated *that* badly as of this evening so we opted to not IV her again with fluids. Mouth mucous membranes wet, saliva production OK, capillary refill sufficient, gums pale pink. There is slight neck skin tenting but resolves in under 2 seconds and she’s lost weight over the last two weeks.
I made her a rehydration bucket (15 grams of regular un-iodized salt, 15 grams of potassium-only fake salt, 20 grams of sugar all dissolved in 4.5 L of warm water) to go alongside her regular bucket of plain water in case she wanted that instead of regular water. (I am a hopeless dork.) She also has a mineral block if she wants that. For eating, she has bagged alfalfa chop, second-cut hay, milk pellet kibble, and eq-8 gut health kibble. She is doing a better job at eating, cleaned up her milk pellet kibble last night, first time in two weeks, and made a hole in the alfalfa chop clean to the bottom of the tub.
She was not shivering in her blanket (with extra straps, it does stay on) and was happily eating grass in the field with her aunties when I went over to put her in at 7:30 PM. Also she tried to kick Trys when she shot her with penicillin today. That’s new.
She’s still dead. Her bloodwork numbers are not all normal yet. She’s eating better, but not as well as she should. She’s drinking better, but not perfect yet. I want a full week of normal eating and drinking and peeing and pooping PLUS ALSO good bloodwork numbers and normal temps before she can be not-dead.
She is not dehydrated *that* badly as of this evening so we opted to not IV her again with fluids. Mouth mucous membranes wet, saliva production OK, capillary refill sufficient, gums pale pink. There is slight neck skin tenting but resolves in under 2 seconds and she’s lost weight over the last two weeks.
I made her a rehydration bucket (15 grams of regular un-iodized salt, 15 grams of potassium-only fake salt, 20 grams of sugar all dissolved in 4.5 L of warm water) to go alongside her regular bucket of plain water in case she wanted that instead of regular water. (I am a hopeless dork.) She also has a mineral block if she wants that. For eating, she has bagged alfalfa chop, second-cut hay, milk pellet kibble, and eq-8 gut health kibble. She is doing a better job at eating, cleaned up her milk pellet kibble last night, first time in two weeks, and made a hole in the alfalfa chop clean to the bottom of the tub.
She was not shivering in her blanket (with extra straps, it does stay on) and was happily eating grass in the field with her aunties when I went over to put her in at 7:30 PM. Also she tried to kick Trys when she shot her with penicillin today. That’s new.
She’s still dead. Her bloodwork numbers are not all normal yet. She’s eating better, but not as well as she should. She’s drinking better, but not perfect yet. I want a full week of normal eating and drinking and peeing and pooping PLUS ALSO good bloodwork numbers and normal temps before she can be not-dead.
(no subject)
Oct. 24th, 2018 06:59 amSummary of baby horse woes for my memories.
Friday when baby horse turned three months old, I sent off the registration papers. When I got home after work, baby horse nose was swollen to where it did not really fit in the halter. I left Trys a note suggesting nose was swollen and maybe bees?
Saturday nose was still swollen. Trys got antibiotics (vet was concerned about cellulitis) and antihistamines for baby horse and we started to give them on Sunday.
On Monday, the swelling moved to baby horse eyeball. It looked horrible enough that Trys called the vet. Vet added a different antibiotic (injectable Excede or whatever) which we started on Tuesday.
Wednesday, vet came out to look at the eyeball to see if there was still an eyeball. There was. Might or might not be blind, but at least it wasn’t exploded. Eyeball started to look a little better with the new drugs.
By Thursday, baby horse was dull and lethargic and not eating. We stopped the banamine and the pill antibiotic.
Friday she looked worse. Trys pulled blood and took it into work. Diagnosis: kidney failure. Elevated BUN and Creatinine. Plan was to flush the toxins via IV therapy.
Saturday morning Trys ran IV fluids into the baby. Same for Saturday evening. Baby horse was peeing and pooping and eating and drinking after the IV fluids. Perked up a lot with the IV fluids.
Sunday morning, she got IV fluids but Sunday night we blew a vein so no fluids then or Monday morning. We put a baby horse blanket on her for the shivering.
Monday daytime we ran bloodwork again. Creatinine had dropped from 11 to 8, but BUN still over 140 (it only goes to 140) and baby was dehydrated. Monday evening she was quite dehydrated and we had the vet come and sew in a catheter. 4 L of fluid. Baby shivering in not especially cold weather. We warmed up the IV fluids first but that didn’t help. Put the foal coat on the baby following doctoring.
Tuesday morning, foal coat not on baby. We ran 4 L of fluid, put foal coat back on baby. No shivering.
Tuesday evening foal coat not on baby when we arrived for evening fluids. Baby not a fan of the foal coat. Noted. Her face and lower lip were swollen on right side only. Pitting edema, but not hot or sore like cellulitis. Horse eating well. Not shivering. Alert and oriented. Whinnied to see us. We put in 1.5 L of fluid in the evening and stopped there because she looked really swollen up, like getting bigger while you looked at it. We tried to call vet but his phone was dead. Did not put foal coat back on horse baby because if she wants to die cold, that’s her right.
Wednesday AM Trys got a hold of the vet. He said the swollen face was indicative of congestive heart failure and that we should reduce IV fluids but not stop them. 1 L of fluids in the AM on Wednesday, as per vet. Trys says swollen face looked slightly better in the AM but blew back up again when she ran the AM fluids. Ugh. She says it’s soft and squishy now, like a bag of water. Ew.
Trys put baby horse outside some for the afternoon, about three hours, and baby horse seemed to enjoy that, grazed, hung out with her aunties. She also took a urine sample in to the vet. Urine sample specific gravity is 1.0013 which is to be expected with pushing fluids into baby. It’s low, just barely in the “normal” range. (Normal is 1.012 to 1.035.)
We still feel this is a dead baby, but she’s not currently in any pain, so…
Also, we opted out of PM fluids this evening because (a) face still swollen and it blows up every time we run a liter of fluid into the filly and (b) filly coughs weirdly when we run more fluid into her, has for both last night and this morning’s efforts. We are worried about lung infiltration and possible pneumonia and she is eating and drinking pretty well. Vet is still calling for fluids for baby horse but we are not doing it. If she dies, I will feel guilty.
Tomorrow we draw blood and look at the creatinine value. She started out with a creatinine of 11. It dropped to 8 after Saturday/Sunday fluid efforts, blood draw on Monday morning. But, we need to see real progress. If it’s 3 or lower, tomorrow, baby can live another day, assuming she’s up to it.
If it’s still 7 or 8… no. There is no kidney function. There is no other way to make the kidneys work again and horses don’t get dialysis. (Dialysis is brutal for humans and they understand what’s going on. It’s just cruel for horses.) If we have a 7 or an 8, we will put her down.
If it’s a 4? We will stick with discontinued fluids, wait a week, and check her again. Creatinine may continue to fall. It may go back up. But, it’s not an automatic death sentence at 4.
If it’s 5 or 6? No, I think we’re done. Not enough function recovered for her to do anything but die slowly of kidney failure.
So, tomorrow. Should know by noon.
Friday when baby horse turned three months old, I sent off the registration papers. When I got home after work, baby horse nose was swollen to where it did not really fit in the halter. I left Trys a note suggesting nose was swollen and maybe bees?
Saturday nose was still swollen. Trys got antibiotics (vet was concerned about cellulitis) and antihistamines for baby horse and we started to give them on Sunday.
On Monday, the swelling moved to baby horse eyeball. It looked horrible enough that Trys called the vet. Vet added a different antibiotic (injectable Excede or whatever) which we started on Tuesday.
Wednesday, vet came out to look at the eyeball to see if there was still an eyeball. There was. Might or might not be blind, but at least it wasn’t exploded. Eyeball started to look a little better with the new drugs.
By Thursday, baby horse was dull and lethargic and not eating. We stopped the banamine and the pill antibiotic.
Friday she looked worse. Trys pulled blood and took it into work. Diagnosis: kidney failure. Elevated BUN and Creatinine. Plan was to flush the toxins via IV therapy.
Saturday morning Trys ran IV fluids into the baby. Same for Saturday evening. Baby horse was peeing and pooping and eating and drinking after the IV fluids. Perked up a lot with the IV fluids.
Sunday morning, she got IV fluids but Sunday night we blew a vein so no fluids then or Monday morning. We put a baby horse blanket on her for the shivering.
Monday daytime we ran bloodwork again. Creatinine had dropped from 11 to 8, but BUN still over 140 (it only goes to 140) and baby was dehydrated. Monday evening she was quite dehydrated and we had the vet come and sew in a catheter. 4 L of fluid. Baby shivering in not especially cold weather. We warmed up the IV fluids first but that didn’t help. Put the foal coat on the baby following doctoring.
Tuesday morning, foal coat not on baby. We ran 4 L of fluid, put foal coat back on baby. No shivering.
Tuesday evening foal coat not on baby when we arrived for evening fluids. Baby not a fan of the foal coat. Noted. Her face and lower lip were swollen on right side only. Pitting edema, but not hot or sore like cellulitis. Horse eating well. Not shivering. Alert and oriented. Whinnied to see us. We put in 1.5 L of fluid in the evening and stopped there because she looked really swollen up, like getting bigger while you looked at it. We tried to call vet but his phone was dead. Did not put foal coat back on horse baby because if she wants to die cold, that’s her right.
Wednesday AM Trys got a hold of the vet. He said the swollen face was indicative of congestive heart failure and that we should reduce IV fluids but not stop them. 1 L of fluids in the AM on Wednesday, as per vet. Trys says swollen face looked slightly better in the AM but blew back up again when she ran the AM fluids. Ugh. She says it’s soft and squishy now, like a bag of water. Ew.
Trys put baby horse outside some for the afternoon, about three hours, and baby horse seemed to enjoy that, grazed, hung out with her aunties. She also took a urine sample in to the vet. Urine sample specific gravity is 1.0013 which is to be expected with pushing fluids into baby. It’s low, just barely in the “normal” range. (Normal is 1.012 to 1.035.)
We still feel this is a dead baby, but she’s not currently in any pain, so…
Also, we opted out of PM fluids this evening because (a) face still swollen and it blows up every time we run a liter of fluid into the filly and (b) filly coughs weirdly when we run more fluid into her, has for both last night and this morning’s efforts. We are worried about lung infiltration and possible pneumonia and she is eating and drinking pretty well. Vet is still calling for fluids for baby horse but we are not doing it. If she dies, I will feel guilty.
Tomorrow we draw blood and look at the creatinine value. She started out with a creatinine of 11. It dropped to 8 after Saturday/Sunday fluid efforts, blood draw on Monday morning. But, we need to see real progress. If it’s 3 or lower, tomorrow, baby can live another day, assuming she’s up to it.
If it’s still 7 or 8… no. There is no kidney function. There is no other way to make the kidneys work again and horses don’t get dialysis. (Dialysis is brutal for humans and they understand what’s going on. It’s just cruel for horses.) If we have a 7 or an 8, we will put her down.
If it’s a 4? We will stick with discontinued fluids, wait a week, and check her again. Creatinine may continue to fall. It may go back up. But, it’s not an automatic death sentence at 4.
If it’s 5 or 6? No, I think we’re done. Not enough function recovered for her to do anything but die slowly of kidney failure.
So, tomorrow. Should know by noon.
(no subject)
Oct. 16th, 2018 07:57 amI still have a baby horse. She has managed to cut her hip (not dreadful, just unsightly), swell up her nose alarmingly (antihistimines) which is now looking slightly better after four days but also now has swollen the left side of her face and eyeball to where a vet visit is indicated. Mystery ailment, there. I was thinking bee stings, but… twice?
This was supposed to be easy. Happy mare, happy baby. Now I have dead mare and sickly baby.
I sent off the registration papers at the three-month mark because I figured she’d make it by then. Guess that was premature, but honestly the papers get more expensive after the six month mark and I didn’t want to forget.
Waiting to hear back from the vet. *sigh*
Damn it.
This was supposed to be easy. Happy mare, happy baby. Now I have dead mare and sickly baby.
I sent off the registration papers at the three-month mark because I figured she’d make it by then. Guess that was premature, but honestly the papers get more expensive after the six month mark and I didn’t want to forget.
Waiting to hear back from the vet. *sigh*
Damn it.
(no subject)
Sep. 28th, 2018 12:34 pmI still have a mare (barely) and a baby horse. Baby horse at 2.5 months is doing pretty well eating the milk kibble, is a champ at alfalfa and hay. Mare is not doing well eating much of anything. Vet is confounded, has offered a free post-mortem so we can find out what was actually wrong with her after the fact. We’re not to post-mortem yet but it won’t be long.
This story has a happy ending.
Jul. 15th, 2018 12:33 pmLast year I bred my mare Nick (age 20) to an appropriate stallion in the hopes of getting a baby. Wednesday, July 11, she looked like this:
This story has a happy ending. Let me just put that out there at the front end. There are some scary parts, but it ends happily.
( Read more? )
This story has a happy ending. Let me just put that out there at the front end. There are some scary parts, but it ends happily.
( Read more? )
