Saturday, March 14, 2009

Update & Answers

I received no call from the hospital last night, which means Aaruba is still holding steady or improving. I think it's likely he'll get a bit of Senior mash today. I'll spend some time with him, take him for a couple walks, try to keep his mind quiet. Now that he's feeling better, he could become a littler harder to manage, mentally, because of his dislike of confinement.

Some of you have wondered about how this misadventure will affect Aaruba's stomach, considering his history of gastric ulcers. As part of the diagnostics for this colic, we scoped him and found no ulcers, which is good in and of itself. However, it means that the symptoms we'd been attributing to ulcers in the past couple months were caused by something else -- something unknown and possibly more sinister. Anyway, to avoid recurrence of the ulcers, we're had Aaruba on a maintenance dose of omeprazole (GastroGard) so he won't have an overabundance of acid in his empty stomach.

Also, several people have asked me for an explanation of refluxing. I'm no vet, but here's my layman's explanation:

A horse's small intestines secrete fluids to aid in the extraction of nutrients from feed. Normally, these fluids continue into the large intestines, where they are reabsorbed into the horse's body. However, if a portion of the horse's gut is obstructed and the fluids are unable to pass through, they back up into the stomach. A horse's stomach has about a 4-gallon capacity, and a sphincter where it joins the esophagus prevents vomiting. In a horse with an obstructed gut, therefore, fluids with nowhere to go build pressure in the stomach and can cause it to rupture, which is fatal.

To relieve this pressure in a case like Aaruba's (small intestine impaction, in which fluids excreted by the small intestine refluxed into his stomach), vets pass a tube down the esophagus to siphon off the excess fluid, relieving pressure and resultant discomfort. The process must be repeated every few hours if the horse continues to reflux, in order to protect the stomach until the obstruction can be eliminated. Diagnostically, of course, refluxing is an indicator that the gut is indeed obstructed; that's why it was concerning that Aaruba refluxed a little yesterday afternoon, though he had not done so several hours before.

Okay, I'm off to try to eat some breakfast and visit Aaruba. Many, many thanks for all your comments and emails and blog posts of support as we continue through this ordeal. They mean more than I can say.

6 comments:

Cactus Jack Splash said...

Thanks for the explaination. Glad to hear he is holding his own

Tamara Baysinger said...

Holding his own, indeed, Splash. He is one tough pony. (Not unlike yours!)

Unknown said...

I hope so very much you can find a solution or at least a way to maintain Arruba in health. We went through something similar with one of our mustangs about five years ago. In his case, we were unable to save him because of a tumor; but it seems you are way, way ahead of where we were at the time in diagnosing and treatment of your dear boy. I wish and pray for the best of outcomes for you. Carmon

Jonna said...

He's clearly a fighter. I hope this upward trend contiues.

Anonymous said...

OHNO! I just saw your posts about Aruba... thank goodness that he is doing well at hospital. Keeping him in my thoughts and that he steadily improves!

Anonymous said...

Tamra,
I am so sorry you and Aaruba are having to go through this. Somehow I managed to miss the beginning of the drama.
He's a tough guy, and I"m sure he'll be fine, but I know that doesn't make the fear any less.