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Discussion on Help? | |
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New Member: Jfella |
Posted on Tuesday, Jun 22, 2004 - 2:36 am: I have run into kinda of a complicated problem or problems, and any help would be appreciated.I have standardbred racehorse 4yrs old, that I've had for three months. I pulled his blood when I originally got him(the following morning after he raced), it looked like this: WBC 5.7 RBC 8.19 Hgb 13.7 Hct 38.8 MCV 47.4 MCH 16.7 MCHC 35.3 PLT Adq ALP 105 GGT 32 BUN- 16 LD 437 CK 1398 AST 1102 GLU 75 PHOS 3.2 ALBG 3.1 TBIL 2.9 TP 6.6 CA 12.3 CRE 1.4 NA 139.9 K 3.76 T4 1.5 Not bad, except for he tied up. After my vet and I looked him over and watch him jogged we both thought he had a very mild case of EPM. So I started him on daily Sulfa and Pyrimethamine. He raced good for the first 5 starts I had him, over a two month period. The last 3 starts have been sub par. Over the last three starts he has developed a gradual head nod that worsened with each start and was also losing weight desite an increase in grain. With the last start breaking stride I decided look at his blood again and got these disturbing results (again the morning after race): WBC 4.9 Seg 81 Lymph 18 Eosin 1 RBC 5.59 Hgb 9.6 Hct 28.1 MCV 50.3 MCH 17.2 MCHC 34.1 PLT Adq ALP 97 GGT 28 BUN- 16 LD 200 CK 141 AST 380 GLU 105 PHOS 2.0 ALBG 2.9 TBIL 5.4 TP 5.6 CA 11.7 CRE 1.5 NA 139 K 3.45 The first thought that came to my mind when my vet read me the numbers over the phone was I got an epogen crash. My vet concurred. Epogen or EPO is abused in the race horse industry. But as we monitored his blood levels they started to rise over the week so I kind of ruled it because from what I read EPO crashes don't get better that quick without anything being done. He has stood in the stall for two weeks, only getting hand walked 20 min a day. Over the two weeks we pulled CBC a couple times, 2 days later we got: WBC 5.0 Seg 59 Lymph 38 Mono 3 RBC 6.65 Hgb 11.6 Hct 33 MCV 49.6 MCH 17.4 MCHC 35.2 PLT Adq 3 Days Later WBC 3.5 Seg 49 Lymph 48 Eosin 2 RBC 6.28 Hgb 11 Hct 31.4 MCV 50 MCH 17.5 MCHC 35 PLT Adq 2 Days later WBC 4.1 Seg 74 Lymph 26 RBC 5.57 Hgb 9.7 Hct 28 MCV 50.2 MCH 17.4 MCHC 34.7 PLT Adq 3 days after that WBC 4.6 Seg 63 Lymph 34 Mono 1 Eosin 2 RBC 6.78 Hgb 11.9 Hct 34.2 MCV 50.5 MCH 17.6 MCHC 34.8 PLT Adq 4 Days Later: WBC 4.1 Seg 69 Lymph 30 Eosin 1 RBC 6.92 Hgb 12.1 Hct 34.9 MCV 50.5 MCH 17.5 MCHC 34.6 PLT Adq Oh should mention that over that 2 week period my vet gave him shots twice of pneumabort, folic acid, and hip iron. Which leaves me to where I am now. The only thing my vet thinks has a remote chance of screwing his blood up so bad was we tubed him with a tube of Marquis. Now if that was the only problem, yeah I wish. So I jogged him a mile on Saturday, he was a little stiff but overall not bad. Was hand walked on Sunday, and today Monday he walked out to the track perfect but as soon as asked him to trot a little oh was it ugly. He had a six foot head nod, he was stumbling so bad behind that I had to keep the bit in his mouth to hold him up. I got my vet and had him watch him go another lap, he said EPM. I have to agree, but I don't understand the drastic difference from Saturday to Monday. Also I don't know if this has anything to do with the EPM, the weight loss, or the messed up blood, but he is been real back sore for the last month. My vet thinks may be send him to a university and get a bone marow biosy just to see if there is a problem with production. Tommorow morning he is going to pull another CBC a see where we are at. But if anyone has suggestions or have seen something similar before it would be greatly appreciated Thank you, Tony |
Moderator: DrO |
Posted on Tuesday, Jun 22, 2004 - 7:41 am: There is a simple explanation for the rapid change in your horses Hct Tony and if has nothing to do with disease. The high value was taken when the horse was either very excited or post strenuous exercise. For an explanation of this phenomena see, Equine Diseases » Cardiovascular, Blood, and Immune System » The Diagnosis of Anemia.Without a set of units and your labs normal values it is impossible to interpret your other lab values. DrO |
Member: Jfella |
Posted on Tuesday, Jun 22, 2004 - 12:57 pm: Here are the rangesWBC (6.1-11.8) RBC (6.5-11.8) Hgb (11-15) g/dL Hct (32-46) % MCV (38-52) um3 MCH (13-19) uug MCHC (30-38) g/dl PLT Adq ALP (90 - 325) IU/L GGT (6 - 36) IU/L BUN- (10 - 33) mg/dL LD (120 - 375) IU/L CK (40 - 300) IU/L AST (210 - 400) IU/L GLU (68 - 130) mg/dL PHOS (2 - 5.1) mg/dL ALBG (2.2 - 3.4) g/dL TBIL (0 - 3.8) mg/dL TP (5.7 - 7.9) g/dL CA (11.6-13.4) mg/dL CRE (.9 - 1.4) mg/dL NA (132 - 146) mmol/L K (2.8 - 4.5) mmol/L Thanks I will read up on that section |
Moderator: DrO |
Posted on Wednesday, Jun 23, 2004 - 9:13 am: Anthony,Your horses poor performance is most likely due to the lameness you describe above, which has nothing to do with the blood work. I do have one other question, how long did you leave the horse on the Trimethoprim / Sulfa? It is known to suppress RBC production with long term use. DrO |