Day of Reckoning

On April 5 Demetrias and I and 3 friends made the trek to Raleigh, North Carolina for an appointment with the ophtho department. Everything about the trip was a new adventure for D. He found his shipping boots to be unbelievably frustrating and after tromping on my foot loaded onto the trailer as if it was nothing. My foot, however, was quite painful.

After 4.5 hours in the trailer we arrived just in time for our 2:30 appointment. D saw Dr. M. who confirmed what Dr. W. had already thought- uveitis.

D was unbelievably brave. I have no idea what he thought of the hospital but I thought it was overwhelming. He willingly followed me everywhere but walked so close that my other foot got smashed as well. The floor kept changing color and that was throwing him for a loop. The hardest thing was getting him into the stall because he was going from grey concrete to black. I ended up backing him into the stall. After that he contented himself with chewing on the feed bucket.

D was diagnosed with bilateral (both eyes) chronic uveitis which was caused by his immune system as best they can tell. Through research and asking a lot of questions I've learned that D's type of uveitis, immune system induced, is much more common then most of us think. 1 in 10 horses contract uveitis but amazingly we still don't know a lot about it. Its typically thought to be an Appaloosa thing however they usually don't have as much pain and just go blind. Thoroughbreds and warmbloods however, have very painful experiences. Again, not exactly sure why. Uveitis seems to be like cancer in human, each case is unique and responds differently. Most of the time its contracted from the immune system or an extremely hard fall/ blow to the head.

Anyone reading this interested in becoming a vet?? Equine ophthalmology is a needy field.

So, my horse has uveitis, this was just the beginning of a very emotional rollercoaster.

We came home that night with 4 medicines and hope for implant surgery.

D had to get

Neo-poly-dex 4x a day

Atropine 2x a day

Banamine 2x a day and

Ranitidine 2x a day in his food.

Attempting to get all his medicines together was daunting but I keep him with some pretty amazing people and we had a challenge= get his eyes ready for surgery.