{"id":4655,"date":"2025-02-09T01:53:06","date_gmt":"2025-02-09T01:53:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/megastorytales.com\/?p=4655"},"modified":"2025-02-09T01:53:06","modified_gmt":"2025-02-09T01:53:06","slug":"vet-adventures-how-not-to-treat-a-horses-wound","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/megastorytales.com\/archives\/4655","title":{"rendered":"Vet Adventures: How Not to Treat a Horse\u2019s Wound"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class='\"td-post-header\"'>\n<header class='\"td-post-title\"'>\n<p class='\"td-post-sub-title\"'>Dr. Diehl\u2019s wound treatment advice goes unheeded until a certain turn of events.\n\n\n</p><div class='\"td-post-content\"'>\n<figure id='\"attachment_921155\"' class='\"wp-caption' aligncenter aria-describedby='\"caption-attachment-921155\"'><img loading='\"lazy\"' decoding='\"async\"' class='\"size-full' wp-image-921155 td-animation-stack-type0-1 src="%5C%22https:%5C/%5C/www.horseillustrated.com%5C/wp-content%5C/uploads%5C/1-horse-wound-vet-adventures.jpg%5C%22" sizes='\"auto,' srcset='\"https:\/\/www.horseillustrated.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/1-horse-wound-vet-adventures.jpg' https: alt='\"A' vet applies a bandage to leg wound on horse width='\"1200\"' height='\"800\"'><figcaption id='\"caption-attachment-921155\"' class='\"wp-caption-text\"'>Photo by wavebreakmedia\/shutterstock\n<div class='\"td-a-rec' td-a-rec-id-content_inline td_uid_1_6792bd0a2f721_rand td_block_template_8>\n<p>I\u2019d been treating my patient, a sweet <strong>Quarter Horse mare named Maizey, for almost two weeks. Maizey had been running loose in a side pasture and got tangled in some <strong>fencing wire. I\u2019d spent a very long night stitching the horse\u2019s chest and torso back together. I wasn\u2019t terribly worried about those wounds; it was the horse\u2019s leg wound that was the problem.\n<p>&nbsp;\n</p><p>The wire had wrapped around Maizey\u2019s lower front leg and had tightened like a tourniquet. As the poor mare fought to get free, she succeeded in lacerating and degloving the cannon area from the knee to the ankle, and there was almost 5 inches of exposed bone on the leg with a large slab of damaged tissues hanging from the leg.&nbsp;\n</p><h2>Purple Power\n</h2><p>Fortunately, Celia realized quickly that her beloved mare was missing, and she and her husband went searching for her. Carl had cut Maizey free from the wire and pulled out his pet remedy: the purple spray found in almost every barn, despite me scolding him every time he used it.\n</p><div class='\"enewsletter20' body-sec>\n<div class='\"details\"'><label>Get Our Free Weekly Enewsletter About Horses\n\n\n<p>By the time I arrived, Maizey was purple as well as red from the blood, and after I\u2019d finished cleaning her up, I was purple and red from head to toe as well.\n</p><p>Carl roared with laughter when he saw me and informed me that I was going to be purple for some time, \u201ccause that ain\u2019t gonna wash off easily, Doc. It\u2019s good strong stuff, and that\u2019s why I like it.\u201d\n</p><p>I\u2019d gritted my teeth and pulled out a bottle of rubbing alcohol to clean my hands and arms. My clothing was beyond help, and I knew from experience that the stains weren\u2019t coming out. Carl received another scolding from both Celia and I, but he paid no attention.\n</p><p>Carl suffered from chronic kidney and bladder stones, and lately he was visiting his doctor more and more frequently. After ribbing me for a while, he\u2019d hopped in his truck to head to an appointment.\n</p><p>When Celia led Maizey down the aisle toward me for our weekly recheck, I could tell by her face that Carl had been at it again. There was a Vetrap and duct tape bandage on the horse\u2019s lower leg that had slid down and was flopping around the ankle, exposing the wound. Even worse, it was purple again.\n</p><p>Celia brought her horse to a halt in front of me and gave me her special exasperated-with-Carl death look. I knew Carl was in for it when he returned from yet another doctor\u2019s appointment.\n</p><p>\u201cLet\u2019s see what we\u2019ve got, Celia,\u201d I said as I began to cut the bandage off. \u201cMaybe Carl went easy this time.\u201d\n</p><h2>Chemical Overload on the Wound\n</h2><p>Unfortunately, Carl had not gone easy this time. In fact, he\u2019d outdone himself, and I groaned when I saw a thick coating of the stuff on the leg.\n</p><p>Maizey had a stained muzzle from licking at the wound, and the horse left a large colorful smear across Celia\u2019s barn jacket. Celia dragged the hose over grimly and began to wash the wound, as purple water ran across the barn floor and down the drain.\n</p><p>It took almost 30 minutes to get Maizey cleaned up, and because the spray was almost 90 percent alcohol, I had to place a special dressing on the leg. Wounds don\u2019t like caustic chemicals and get irritated very easily. If all infection is gone, they prefer a clean, moist and quiet healing environment so that the healing cells can migrate to where they\u2019re needed and not be disturbed, irritated by chemicals or scrubbed off by overzealous wound cleanings. My old mentor, Dr. George Platt, used to tell me sternly that if I wouldn\u2019t put a particular substance in my eye, don\u2019t put it on a horse\u2019s wound, and I followed those instructions religiously.\n</p><p>As I finished bandaging Maizey, Celia muttered that she was going to put a padlock on the stall door to keep Carl out. As I walked out of the barn, I heard the familiar roar of Carl\u2019s old truck, and soon he was parking in front of the barn. Celia remained behind, presumably to throw away every bottle of purple stuff that she could find. But when she heard the truck pull up, she hastened out of the barn, clutching a remaining can of the spray.\n</p><h2>Giving Up for Good\n</h2><p>Carl exited his truck and slowly walked toward us. Patch, his beloved Border Collie, shot out from underneath a nearby bush and followed him over.\n</p><p>\u201cCarl, are you OK?\u201d I asked. I\u2019d never once seen Carl move slowly.\n</p><p>He grimaced. \u201cThey flushed out the plumbing today.\u201d He pointed miserably at his groin. \u201cIt hurts like hell, Doc.\u201d\n</p><p>Celia was moving towards us shaking the spray menacingly, and on a whim, I grabbed the bottle from her and started reading the label out loud.\n</p><p>\u201cNinety percent alcohol, wow, that\u2019ll burn out just about any infection! And gentian violet soaks deeply into inflamed tissues. You might pee purple for a while, but Carl, you should use this stuff to treat your bladder infection!\u201d\n</p><p>Carl looked me in horror, and I gave him an innocent smile and offered him the bottle. He muttered something, then headed to the house in a stiff, crouching gait, Patch at his side.\n</p><p>Celia was howling with laughter.\n</p><p>\u201cOh dear! Dr. Diehl, I don\u2019t know what gets into you sometimes! I bet Carl never goes near this stuff again!\u201d\n</p><p>Eventually I started packing up my truck. Celia gave me a quick hug, then smiled sadly.\n</p><p>\u201cI better go tend to my husband, Doc. He\u2019s not getting any younger and this bladder problem really worries me.\u201d\n</p><p>I was starting to feel a little guilty, but Celia winked at me.\n</p><p>\u201cI think I\u2019ll hang a bottle of that purple stuff on the refrigerator door. Then he won\u2019t eat all the ice cream.\u201d\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"</p><p>Dr. Diehl\u2019s wound treatment advice goes unheeded until a certain turn of events. Photo by wavebreakmedia\/shutterstock I\u2019d been treating my patient, a sweet Quarter Horse mare named Maizey, for almost &hellip; \n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4655","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/megastorytales.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4655","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/megastorytales.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/megastorytales.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/megastorytales.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/megastorytales.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4655"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/megastorytales.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4655\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4656,"href":"https:\/\/megastorytales.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4655\/revisions\/4656"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/megastorytales.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4655"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/megastorytales.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4655"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/megastorytales.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4655"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}</p></label></div></div></strong></strong></p></div></figcaption></figure></div></header></div>