Home Again, Home Again Lickety Split

Okay so the plans have changed. Rather than doing the more extensive test under general anesthesia, Megan came home with a bag full of meds to be treated as if she has EPM for the next month. It's killing me to remain the dark of whether or not she has Wobblers for 28 days (at least), but the a conversation with the vet who had spoken with my insurance company put things in pretty stark terms.

If we had proceeded with the test tomorrow and she had shown definitive evidence of Wobblers, the vet's recommendation would have been to euthanize her rather than putting her thru the stress and dangers of waking her up. My insurance company would not support euthanasia (i.e. pay the claim) as she is not yet considered Grade 3 for neurological symptoms. On the other hand the insurance company will pay for treatment for EPM based on the current symptoms and a blood test. This treatement will run nearly $1000, so it's no small thing.

So we treat and wait and see -- yeah that's gonna kill me. (I'm gonna learn all about limbo K-Bod) On the good news side we brought her home today and it's hard to believe anything is wrong with her. Tomorrow when it's not so late, I'll paste in the symptoms for both EPM and Wobblers, but suffice it to say she shows NONE of them. She should be unsteady on her feet, depressed, prone to stumbling and falling. (The discharge papers have in all caps that she should not be ridden as she is a danger to herself and a rider -- they also urge extreme caution in handling her as she may fall at any time.) Well bollocks on all that. We put her in a paddock and she promptly laid down and rolled and leapt to her feet and took off bucking and running. A few minutes later she turned her neck to her haunch and scratched an itch while propping on three legs. This horse is far from unsteady on her feet.

The meds are all oral and getting them in her is a real treat ... for an observer. The first is a liquid that you put in a big syringe and then inject into her mouth. Steve got lots of laughs out of watching me get slung around and covered in the white medicine. I looked like I'd showered in it by the time we were done, but I think I got most of it in her -- only 3 more nights of that one thankfully. The second treatment is a paste in a huge honkin' tube -- no sneaking up on her with that one. More flailing about the stall, but the deed was done, 2 down and 26 more to go. The bright spot was vitamen E gelcaps. She needs 10,000 units and each pill is 400 units -- do the math, that's 25 gelcaps to convince her to eat. Eat them she did, out of my hand, like candy, YES! At least one thing won't be a battle. We stocked up at Sam's to wage the war of getting her treated. Four liters of Coke (a new one on me, you mix it with the meds and feed and they like the cola so much they slurp it down... in theory) and two giant bottles of Mrs. Butterworth's syrup. She may not have any teeth left at the end of all this, but she'll by golly get her meds.

This week Katherine is going to come out and do some of the neurological exams so that I can see and understand what her deficits are. I'm choosing to hope (yes, I may be reaching) that this is all just a misdiagnosis. As much as I respect the vet at UGA, I'm hoping she was just flat wrong -- stranger things have happened. But then I also play the lottery so I don't require much in the way of odds to think positively... Better to spend 28 days in the bliss of denial than mourning her every day.