I wanted to share with everyone this article from this week’s Chronicle. This was my horse Sheldon. I am on a mission to help inform people about this horrible disease as well as other neurologic disorders. If anyone wants to reach out to me privately about their horse I am happy to try and help. I know when I was going through this with Sheldon that I really valued speaking to people who had been through similar situations.
I just read that article and THANK YOU for sharing your difficult journey. I cried at my daughter’s soccer practice while reading your story. I had never heard of EDM. Sheldon looked like a once in a lifetime horse. You did so much for him and he had done so much for you…Yup - here I go tearing up again! Thank you though. It was an informative read as well as heartfelt.
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Thank you for your kind words. I really hope it helps people.
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Thank you so much for sharing. Sheldon looks like he was an amazing horse and he was so lucky to have you as an owner.
My horse Skipper was euthanized shortly after his seventh birthday for lameness issues exacerbated by neurological deficits. He wasn’t insured and I never did a myelogram. His neck was a pretty big mess based on radiographs. He has two relatives that I know of who have been euthanized for neurological reasons. I have wondered about EDM with Skipper. There were definitely some personality changes–he went from sweet and tractable to being a spooky nightmare to hand walk. Could have been that, as a prey animal, he felt compromised and that messed with his mind. Could have been that there was spinal compression and it made his legs tingly. We’ll never know. I considered a necropsy out of curiosity, but didn’t have one done.
It is not a pleasant club of which to be a member.
Thank you so much for sharing your story. I’m so sorry about the loss of your beautiful Sheldon.
I, too, have a Sandro Hit gelding with a neurological condition. Sam was diagnosed with a cervical myelopathy nearly six years ago. Like Sheldon, he had various weird lamenesses for about five years, but unlike Sheldon, he didn’t have behavioral changes. After falling three times in a year, I sent him to Rood & Riddle where they did a thorough neuro exam and two myelograms. The vet kindly said ‘you can never ride him again, but he’ll make a great pasture pet’. Sam was 10 at the time.
I’m fortunate that Sam is healthy enough for life as a pasture ornament. His condition doesn’t appear to be degenerative, and as long as he can move his head freely and LOOK at his feet, he’s fine. He’s been happily retired for nearly 6 years. For that, I feel lucky.
Until your article, I had not heard of EDM. Thanks again for sharing your experience - it definitely enlightened me and I hope it will do the same for other horse owners.
~ Lisa
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Again thank you. So here is something that did not make it in the story. Dr. Amy Johnson equated the behavioral changes in EDM to Demetia in humans. She told me a story that the first time she saw the disease in an older horse over 10 years ago a women showed up with a perfectly physically normal looking horse and said, " My horse does not recognize me anymore." They sent the women home and said your horse is fine. The women kept coming back every couple of months saying her horse did not recognize her. Within a year the horse was horribly ill. In necropsy they discovered EDM. At the risk of sounding crazy lady I will tell Sheldon started giving me a lot of worried looks. That demetia part threw me more than anything else.
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And Peggy and snaffle635 I am sorry for what you also went through. Thank you for telling me your stories.
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I know we spoke at the time but I wanted to stop and commend you for bringing Sheldon’s and your experience into the light. I have been the New Bolton Internal Medicine administrative assistant for 5 years this month and I am Dr. Johnson’s admin as part of this. I walked into this job knowing that both good and bad, happy and sad situations would cross my lap and I really worked hard to be able to handle all of it. I don’t think I have ever cried so much at a job but I am constantly buoyed by the courage and determination of our clients to do their absolute best for their beloved animals.
Since I started here in 2014 2 of my own horses have been found to be neurologic as well; one was retired from his job with me and sent to a dear friend (who owns his brother who is also neurologic but much worse) and she is looking forward to many years of low level shows and trail rides. My other was a bit of a surprise and ultimately he was put down due to it.
Neither had EDM but I knew it existed, even if I didn’t know it’s name. After my first year when I was sending discharge letters out every day I noticed in both appointments and in the letters that there seemed to be an additional category of neuro cases. I knew of EPM, Lyme and West Nile. I learned about impingements in the neck. But there were horses like Sheldon and I have watched steadily as this whole other category emerged.
I really cannot tell you how many ways this job has changed me. I see tiny neuro symptoms in TB sale listings on the track videos. I have watched horses at shows and thought “That needs a neuro exam” and I have a whole new appreciation for Vitamin E.
You’ve done such a great thing and I know that spreading the word and showing people actual videos of what even a grade 1 neuro exam on video looks like would be hugely helpful.
For my part I might be able to acquire both sets of videos of both of my horse’s neuro exams with Dr. Johnson. One I definitely have (Grade 3.5/5) and the other I can ask. If this helps with your education, I am TOTALLY down to help.
The really interesting thing is that there are only 3 Equine Neurologists practicing in the US, and of that 3 only 2 are boarded, Dr. Johnson and another who I believe is on the west coast.
We really do need to explain to more riders at large that an internal medicine doctor is trained in Neuro exams and can be very helpful in catching these things early. My guy had only a weird step thing in his hind end that he would do once every 10 strides or so, and the fact that he was pulling rails at 1.10m, which I figured was me riding poorly.
This is what his hind end motions looked like:
How many of us have felt this, and written it off as the footing, a rock, a simple bad step? THIS was the start of finding out that my horse was neurologic.
THANK you for being so strong and pushing for public awareness seminars. Feel free to email me if you need any materials or help getting it going.
All my best
Emily
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Thanks everyone for helping educate us about this condition. That video above is especially helpful. I’m hearing about this more and more. So sorry all of you have been affected by this - the stories are truly heartbreaking.
Emily thank you so much for writing and for your offer of help. I am currently in the process of moving and a bit overwhelmed at the moment but when settle down I will for sure reach out. I remember you well and speaking with you when I booked the appt to come to New Bolton. I too had that feeling of every few steps something not quite right but not totally lame either. I also have some video of some in hand neuro exams on Sheldon if anyone would like to see. Again everyone thank you for your kind words and please people tell your friends about this horrible disease and spread the word.
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Thanks so much for sharing your story. It was eye-opening, for sure. I’d love to see the in hand exam clips when you have a chance.
Thank you for your post and sharing your story. I just lost my 16 year old TB gelding this week, as he was neurological. It is nice to know that I was not alone in all experiencing all the not quite right behaviour that went undiagnosed for a long time. It is especially helpful for me to hear your story, because there are people telling me there was nothing wrong with my horse and he was just “not that bright”. It has certainly made a horrible situation that much worse for me. I trust my vet implicitly, and know she would never steer me in the wrong direction and in my heart I know I did the right thing; however, the lack of general knowledge about how neuro symptoms present has resulted in significant judgment of my choice by others.
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@Spud&Saf I am so sorry and I totally understand. One thing I wish the article had gotten into more was how to recognize neurologic vs lame. Interestingly enough though even vets argue about this still. There is an interesting article I am going to share about that point. Will get it off my email now. Also @Melissa.Van Doren I will pm you videos in a few.
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Ok I can not figure out to upload videos. Any tech advice?
Probably easier to upload to some sort of a cloud service (Dropbox, iCloud, Google Docs…) and link to that.
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This is a paragraph from an article I am linking below. I find this incredible.
“In 2014 Emil Olsen, DVM, PhD, MRCVS, who has studied ataxic horses at the Royal Veterinary College’s Structure and Motion Laboratory, in London, published a study in the Journal of Veterinary Internal Medicine. In it, he and his colleagues found that equine health professionals have difficulties agreeing on whether horses are ataxic and to what extent, especially when clinical signs are subtle.”
And working on technology. Not that with it have to enlist one of my boys.
Here at New Bolton we do what’s called First Tuesday lectures. We have a whole series of free lectures open to the public on a myriad of topics. Here’s the best link to find what’s coming next:
https://www.vet.upenn.edu/veterinary-hospitals/NBC-hospital/news-events/first-tuesday-lecture-series
Dr. Johnson did one on diagnosing Neurologic diseases and it was well attended. I went and watched and it was really fascinating to see all the signs and watching our own research neuro horses who are specifically here to teach students about the neuro symptoms, was really neat.
It’s an hour long but a great video to see the myriad of differences.
Em
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Thank you for the video. I can’t wait to get home and watch it.
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Em thanks for posting that. I have watched it before. It’s very informative.
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