Omneity® Pellets
All-In-One Vitamin & Mineral Pellet
Topic:Veterinary Science
Veterinary science and horses encompass the study and application of medical, surgical, and therapeutic practices to maintain and improve the health and welfare of equines. This field addresses a wide range of topics, including disease prevention, diagnosis, and treatment, as well as nutrition, reproduction, and behavior. Research in veterinary science for horses often involves understanding the pathophysiology of equine-specific diseases, developing advanced diagnostic techniques, and improving treatment protocols. This page gathers peer-reviewed research studies and scholarly articles that explore various aspects of veterinary science related to horses, providing insights into the latest advancements and methodologies in equine healthcare.
Caution at choosing a particular colony-forming unit from faecal Escherichia coli: it may not represent the sample profile. Data about phylogenetic classification of Escherichia coli colonizing calves, lambs and foals are routinely neglected and restricted to outdated methodologies, even in the context of antimicrobial susceptibility (AS) testing. Thus, the aim of this study was to determine the phylogenetic diversity and the AS profile of E. coli colony-forming units (CFUs) from faecal samples of healthy animals. Five CFUs of E. coli were randomly selected from each faecal culture of calves (n = 13), foals (n = 13) and lambs (n = 13), totalizing 195 CFUs phylo-typed by quadruplex PCR. The AS profile of five ...
A Farrier Making Every Contact Count: A Microlevel Analysis of Farrier-Client Interaction for Partnership Working in Managing a Horse With Laminitis. There is an evidence base in human and small animal veterinary health care contexts which understands how practitioners engage in partnership working with patients and owners to support adherence to treatment/care plans. However, as yet, it is believed there is no similar evidence base for how practitioners in equine health care contexts work with equine owners. It is argued that this is essential for understanding complex equine practitioner-owner interaction involving the prevention and management of laminitis. The aim of this study was to explore farrier-client interaction where risk manage...
Horses and zebras: probabilities, uncertainty, and cognitive bias in clinical diagnosis. Medical diagnosis is typically an iterative process guided by integration and synthesis of data into a model of disease. However, facts are not the only inputs into this process. A case of medical mis-diagnosis is presented, in which systematic cognitive bias is considered to have played a role in generating error. Specific cognitive biases are cited, and measures that can be taken to minimize their negative impact are reviewed.
A Ten-Stage Protocol for Assessing the Welfare of Individual Non-Captive Wild Animals: Free-Roaming Horses (Equus Ferus Caballus) as an Example. Knowledge of the welfare status of wild animals is vital for informing debates about the ways in which we interact with wild animals and their habitats. Currently, there is no published information about how to scientifically assess the welfare of free-roaming wild animals during their normal day-to-day lives. Using free-roaming horses as an example, we describe a ten-stage protocol for systematically and scientifically assessing the welfare of individual non-captive wild animals. The protocol starts by emphasising the importance of readers having an understanding of animal welfare in a conser...
The Effect of Diet Composition on the Digestibility and Fecal Excretion of Phosphorus in Horses: A Potential Risk of P Leaching? The main horse phosphorus excretion pathway is through the dung. Phosphorus originating from animal dung and manure has harmful environmental effects on waters. The number of horses has increased in many countries, and several studies have pointed that leaching of P from horse paddocks and pastures are hotspots for high P leaching losses. The hypothesis was that feeding regimes might influence phosphorus digestibility and excretion in feces, and therefore the environmental impact of horse husbandry. A digestibility experiment was conducted with six horses fed six forage-based diets to study ph...
The effects of extended photoperiod and warmth on hair growth in ponies and horses at different times of year. Photoperiod is considered the most dominant environmental cue allowing animals to anticipate and adapt to seasonal changes. In seasonally breeding mammals, changes in daylength alter pineal melatonin secretion and pituitary prolactin secretion. During the seasonal transition to shorter winter daylengths, increased production of melatonin and declining prolactin are associated with triggering winter coat growth in many animals. Similarly, studies have shown that artificial extension of photoperiod suppresses melatonin secretion and lifts prolactin inhibition to activate moulting. Four longitudi...
Interrelationships Between Age and Trace Element Concentration in Horse Mane Hair and Whole Blood. The use of hair as a sample matrix to determine the mineral status of an animal has received a lot of interest. The objective of this study was to determine if the trace element content in horse mane hair changed with age when evaluated in a group of horses representing a large age range. As a second objective, whole blood trace element content was evaluated, and its relationship to mane hair trace element content, as well as age, were tested. Therefore, mane hair and whole blood samples were obtained from 59 horses, ranging from 2 months to 26 years in age, housed on the same farm. Mane hai...
Development and validation of a chiral LC-MS method for the enantiomeric resolution of (+) and (-)-medetomidine in equine plasma by using polysaccharide-based chiral stationary phases. The detection and separation of medetomidine enantiomers from the complex biological matrices poses a great analytical challenge, especially in the field of forensic toxicology and pharmacology. Couple of researchers reported resolution of medetomidine using protein-based chiral columns, but the reported method is quiet challenging and tedious to be employed for routine analysis. This research paper reported a method that enables the enantio-separation of medetomidine by using polysaccharide cellulose chiral column. The use of chiralcel OJ-3R column was found to have the highest potential for ...
A Comparison of Traditional and Geometric Morphometric Techniques for the Study of Basicranial Morphology in Horses: A Case Study of the Araucanian Horse from Colombia. Skull size and shape have been widely used to study domestic animal populations and breeds. Although several techniques have been proposed to quantify cranial form, few attempts have been made to compare the results obtained by different techniques. While linear morphometrics has traditionally been used in breed characterization, recent advances in geometric morphometrics have created new techniques for specifically quantifying shape and size. The objective of this study was to compare two morphometric methods for their ability to describe external morphology. For this purpose, 20 skull specim...
Capacitive resistive electric transfer modifies gait pattern in horses exercised on a treadmill. Capacitive resistive electric transfer (CRET), a radiofrequency at 448 kHz, resulted in increased superficial and deep temperature and hemoglobin saturation, faster elimination of metabolic and inflammatory products and enhanced sport performance in humans. This research aims to investigate whether the application of CRET affects the locomotor pattern in horses and to assess whether an accumulative effect appears when two CRET sessions are applied two consecutive days. Methods: Nine horses were subjected to two CRET sessions applied in both right and left sides of neck, shoulder, back and cr...
Green Assets of Equines in the European Context of the Ecological Transition of Agriculture. Despite the decline of equine populations in the middle of the 20th century, the European horse industry is growing again thanks to economic alternatives found in the diversification of the uses of equines (sports, racing, leisure, etc.). Equines have many environmental advantages, but the fragmentation of the sector and the lack of synthetic knowledge about their environmental impacts do not enable the promotion of these assets and their effective inclusion in management practices and European policies. To highlight the equine environmental impacts, a literature review was carried out to cove...
Could snorts inform us on how horses perceive riding? Several previous studies have shown that working conditions (including riding) can induce stress in horses. Riders' actions and postures, when inappropriate, induce stress and conflict behaviours during riding and welfare impairment and negative emotional states outside work. Optimistic biases have been found in leisure horses, which, amongst positive management factors, were ridden with loose reins and low hands. Thus, one can wonder whether horses may positively perceive work or parts of it. Indicators of positive emotions are poorly known yet but we recently found that, out of the working c...
Digestibility of diets containing calcium salts of fatty acids or soybean oil in horses. Calcium salts of fatty acids (CSFAs) frequently are fed to ruminants, but their fate in the equine digestive system is unknown. The purpose of this study was to compare Enertia s/f, a proprietary CSFAs, and soybean (SB) oil with respect to impact on apparent total tract nutrient digestion and cecal fermentation parameters in horses. Eight cecally cannulated Quarter Horses were used in a crossover design in which horses consumed a diet for 32 d consisting of 1.5% body weight (BW) (as-fed) smooth bromegrass hay and 0.5% BW (as-fed) pelleted concentrate containing 4.9% CSFAs or 4.1% SB oil. Fecal...
Responses to death and dying: primates and other mammals. Although some definitions of thanatology-broadly definable as the study of death and dying-exclude nonhumans as subjects, recognition of the scientific value of studying how other species respond to sick, injured, dying and dead conspecifics appears to be growing. And whereas earlier literature was largely characterized by anecdotal descriptions and sometimes fanciful interpretations, we now see more rigorous and often quantitative analysis of various behaviors displayed towards conspecifics (and sometimes heterospecifics) at various stages of incapacitation, including death. Studies of social...
First molecular characterization of Sarcocystis neurona causing meningoencephalitis in a domestic cat in Brazil. Sarcocystis neurona is the main agent associated with equine protozoal myeloencephalitis (EPM). Apart from horses, S. neurona has been occasionally described causing neurologic disease in several other terrestrial animals as well as mortality in marine mammals. Herein, we describe the clinical, pathological, and molecular findings of a fatal case of S. neurona-associated meningoencephalitis in a domestic cat. The causing agent was analyzed by multilocus genotyping, confirming the presence of S. neurona DNA in the tissue samples of the affected animal. Significant molecular differences were fou...
Modelling of amino acid turnover in the horse during training and racing: A basis for developing a novel supplementation strategy. Horses in heavy training in preparation for racing and competition have increased metabolic demands to support the more intensive levels of exercise and recovery. However, little is known at the metabolic level about amino acid turnover and the specific alterations of demand caused by high intensity exercise. During exercise, certain amino acids are required in greater quantities due to disproportionate losses via excretory systems and usage in biosynthetic pathways. This investigation has built a theoretical computer model in an attempt to bring together the published rates of protein intake ...
Preliminary Proof of the Concept of Wild (Feral) Horses Following Light Aircraft into a Trap. Feral horses, wherever managed, typically require population control involving capture for permanent removal or repeatedly for fertility control treatments. The most common method for capturing feral horses is helicopter chasing into traps. With this fear-based strategy, it is difficult to safely capture entire groups. Recapture becomes increasingly difficult, with greater safety risks for pilots and ground staff. As preliminary proof of the concept of capturing free-roaming horses by leading into enclosures with light aircraft rather than driving with helicopters, a consumer-grade quadcopter ...
First report of the isolation and phylogenetic characterization of equine Setaria digitata from India based on mitochondrial COI, 12S rDNA, and nuclear ITS2 sequence data. Equine ocular setariasis arising mainly from ectopic infestation of Setaria digitata is a common vision impairing ophthalmic disease in India, and the identification of this filarial nematode is based solely on morphology. However, morphological characters alone are inadequate to detect and differentiate S. digitata from its congeners. The present communication reports the first phylogenetic characterization of equine S. digitata from India based on sequences derived from the mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase subunit 1 (COI), the mitochondrial small subunit ribosomal DNA (12S rDNA), and the n...
The neurocognitive gains of diagnostic reasoning training using simulated interactive veterinary cases. The present longitudinal study ascertained training-associated transformations in the neural underpinnings of diagnostic reasoning, using a simulation game named "Equine Virtual Farm" (EVF). Twenty participants underwent structural, EVF/task-based and resting-state MRI and diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) before and after completing their training on diagnosing simulated veterinary cases. Comparing playing veterinarian versus seeing a colorful image across training sessions revealed the transition of brain activity from scientific creativity regions pre-training (left middle frontal and temporal...
Weight estimation and hormone concentrations related to body condition in Icelandic and Warmblood horses: a field study. The main objectives of this study were to evaluate the accuracy of different body weight formulas for estimating body weight of Icelandic and Warmblood horses, as well as to assess the associations between the variables cresty neck score, body condition score, and plasma concentrations of leptin, insulin and cortisol. A total of 81 adult (≥ 4 years of age) horses (43 Icelandic and 38 Warmblood horses) was included in this study. The following morphological measurements were collected by two examiners simultaneously; body weight; height at withers; neck length; 0.5 neck length; neck circum...
Evidence of Leptospiral Presence in the Cumberland Gap Region. Leptospirosis is a widespread zoonotic disease that causes reproductive losses and/or hepatorenal failure in a number of animal species. Wild reservoirs of the disease, such as rodents, harbor the causative bacterium, Leptospira spp., in their kidneys and contaminate the environment by excreting infected urine. In this study, we tested small wild mammals, environmental water, and livestock in the Cumberland Gap region of southeastern Appalachia for the presence of pathogenic Leptospira or leptospiral antibodies. Small wild mammals (n = 101) and environmental water samples (n = 89) were screene...
Emergence of West Nile virus lineage 2 in Europe: Characteristics of the first seven cases of West Nile neuroinvasive disease in horses in Austria. We report details of the first seven equine cases of confirmed West Nile neuroinvasive disease in Austria. The cases presented during summer and autumn of 2016 (n = 2), 2017 (n = 3) and 2018 (n = 2). All horses showed gait abnormalities and 6 of 7 horses exhibited fasciculations and/or tremors, and we provide video recordings of these. Three horses also showed cranial nerve involvement. Following rapid improvement, three horses were discharged. Four horses were euthanized due to the severity of clinical signs and subjected to neuropathological examination. West Nile virus (WNV) lineage 2...
Human Relationships with Domestic and Other Animals: One Health, One Welfare, One Biology. Excessive human population growth, uncontrolled use of natural resources, including deforestation, mining, wasteful systems, biodiversity reduction by agriculture, and damaging climate change affect the existence of all animals, including humans. This discussion is now urgent and people are rethinking their links with the animals we use for clothing, food, work, companionship, entertainment, and research. The concepts of one health, one welfare, and one biology are discussed as a background to driving global change. Nothing should be exploited without considering the ethics of the action and t...
Feeding Grass Hay Before Concentrate Mitigates the Effect of Grain-Based Concentrates on Postprandial Plasma Interleukin-1β. When fed to horses, high-starch diets elevate plasma concentrations of interleukin-1β (IL-1β) as soon as 1 hour posteating. This increase in IL-β is possibly because of changes in intestinal pH that result from rapid bacterial fermentation of starches and sugars in the digestive tract. The purpose of this research was to investigate the effect of feeding 0.9 kg of grass hay 30 minutes before feeding a concentrate meal on the postprandial rise in IL-1β, compared with control horses receiving the same concentrate without hay first. Six mature geldings were used in a switchback design. Hor...
Seasonal changes in ROS concentrations and sperm quality in unfrozen and frozen-thawed stallion semen. Oxidative stress is regarded as an important cause of sperm damage during cryopreservation. However, seasonal changes in oxidative status in unfrozen and frozen-thawed stallion sperm have not been well established. We tested the hypothesis that sperm ROS concentrations and lipid peroxidation change between breeding and non-breeding seasons and influence quality of unfrozen and frozen-thawed sperm. Eighteen ejaculates from six Warmblood stallions (8-21 y) known to be fertile, were collected in winter and summer and processed for freezing. After 90 min at +4 °C, some straws from each ejacu...
Optimising the Efficacy of Equine Welfare Communications: Do Equine Stakeholders Differ in Their Information-Seeking Behaviour and Communication Preferences? Information on the management of animals within domestic environments is freely available to animal owners and caregivers either online, or in paper form by request. However, awareness is growing within the animal welfare sector that simply providing written guidelines or educational material is not enough to affect a positive change in owners in relation to animal welfare. In the quest to improve equine welfare, understanding the way that owners and other stakeholders seek information and their communication preferences is key to effective dissemination of up to date equine welfare informatio...
Genetic and serologic surveillance of canine (CIV) and equine (EIV) influenza virus in Nuevo León State, México. Despite the uncontrolled distribution of the Influenza A virus through wild birds, the detection of canine influenza virus and equine influenza virus in Mexico was absent until now. Recently, outbreaks of equine and canine influenza have been reported around the world; the virus spreads quickly among animals and there is potential for zoonotic transmission. Methods: Amplification of the Influenza A virus matrix gene from necropsies, nasal and conjunctival swabs from trash service horses and pets/stray dogs was performed through RT-PCR. The seroprevalence was carried out through Sandwich enzyme...
Toxicological effects of some antiparasitic drugs on equine liver glutathione S-Transferase enzyme activity. Benzimidazoles are antiparasitic drugs having an extensive application field like agriculture, medicine, and especially in veterinary medicine. In this study, we report the effect of some benzimidazole drugs such as ricobendazole (RBZ), thiabendazole (TBZ), albendazole (ALBA) and oxfendazole (OFZ) on glutathione s-transferase (GST) enzyme activity. The kinetics studies, IC and Ki values of the tested drugs on GSTs enzyme activity were investigated. The obtained ranking of IC values were found to be approximately RBZ (53.31 μM, r 0.9778) < OFZ (57.75 μM, r 0.9630) < ALBA (63.00 μM, r 0...
Can Extracorporeal Shockwave Promote Osteogenesis of Equine Bone Marrow-Derived Mesenchymal Stem Cells In Vitro? Both bone marrow-derived mesenchymal stem cells (BMDMSCs) and extracorporeal shockwave (ESW) have shown promise for enhancing fracture repair. If exposure of BMDMSCs to ESW enhances osteogenic differentiation, these therapies may be combined in vivo or used as a method for preconditioning BMDMSCs. The objective of this study was to determine the effect of ESW on the osteogenic ability of equine BMDMSCs. We hypothesized that ESW would promote osteogenesis evidenced by increased gene expression, alkaline phosphatase (ALPL) expression, slide morphologic score, and protein expression. BMDMSCs were...
Challenges in using serological methods to explore historical transmission risk of Chlamydia psittaci in a workforce with high exposure to equine chlamydiosis. This report describes the challenges encountered in using serological methods to study the historical transmission risk of from horses to humans. In 2017, serology and risk factor questionnaire data from a group of individuals, whose occupations involved close contact with horses, were collected to assess the seroprevalence of antibodies to and identify risk factors associated with previous exposure. 147 participants were enrolled in the study, provided blood samples, and completed a questionnaire. On ELISA testing, antibodies to the Chlamydia genus were detected in samples from 17 participa...
