Izzy's Leg: Week 2

I took Izzy to the vet on Saturday for his end of week two exam. While it's not horrible news, we didn't get a "woot woot" from the vet either. Although, the thought of Dr. Tolley woot wooting anything does make me laugh.

Best friend, KG, proved her worth yet again by meeting me at the barn on a ridiculously cold and foggy day to spend her Saturday afternoon with me shooting the breeze at Bakersfield Vet Hospital (BVH). We both agree that being at BVH is far more interesting when it's not your horse being examined or your wallet that's being emptied.

As I knew he would, Izzy hopped into the trailer fairly quickly. I did have to give him a few tugs and make a second run at it, but this horse is not a fighter. He does express a mild opinion, but ultimately he is easily persuaded to follow my suggestion. He unloaded quiet pleasantly, and even though he was in a strange place, he followed me willing into BVH's exam bay and stocks.

After unwrapping the wound, Dr. Tolley gave a bit of a frustrated sigh. Far more proud flesh had developed than he had hoped would. It seems as though my intuition had been right; we should have gone to the vet hospital last weekend. He said no harm had been done, but the healing had been put on hold.

Dr. Tolley at work.

For those who haven't dealt with proud before, basically, it's what happens when the inside tissue grows faster than the skin that covers it does. Proud flesh will continue to grow and mound, even growing over the edges of the skin. When this happens, the skin can't knit the wound closed.

Got proud flesh? Unfortunately, yes.

Fortunately, proud flesh can be stopped with pharmaceutical assistance and bandaging, but it takes vigilant care and frequent debridement. When the vet debrides the wound, he literally cuts away the flesh that has over-grown its area. In Izzy's case, Dr. Tolley used what looked like a razor blade and simply sliced away the excess tissue until it was level with the skin. While I did watch the procedure in its entirety, it was pretty gross, so I refrained from shooting pictures.

As Dr. Tolley removed the excess tissue, the wound bled profusely. He staunched the wound as well as he could, but then wrapped it as I had been doing for the past two weeks. Izzy has another appointment on Friday. Dr. Tolley wants to keep checking on the wound as often as possible to ensure that we stop the development of proud flesh.

We are also going to try a different treatment from what he usually does. While he admitted that he hates change, he is curious to see if a new product will control the proud flesh more quickly than his own White Lotion. Instead of just using the moist pressure bandage, he applied a medicated pad that contains a calcium/something else mixture.

I teach a small amount of chemistry to my students and am more familiar with the periodic table of elements than most people, but he lost me as he rattled off the chemicals contained in this product verses those in the "White Lotion" that BVH makes. Both products are astringents that irritate the flesh, which slows the red blood cells from creating new tissue. The White Lotion that BVH makes is lead based which means it poses some health risks. This new product is calcium based and less of an irritant to the skin cells.

According to the creator of the medicated pad, it will more dramatically slow the growth of proud flesh which will enable the skin cells to do their work. At $14.50 a medicated pad, I hope they work pretty fast!

So our current plan is this: Dr. Tolley wrapped the wound with the medicated pad, covered that with brown gauze, added a telfa pad to cover the lowest part of the wound that the medicated pad couldn't cover and then topped that with more brown gauze. A roll of cotton sheet was then added. Topping that, he applied a pressure bandage of more brown gauze. He sealed the whole thing with a roll of Vet wrap.

I reapplied the same bandage on Monday night. We'll re-evaluate on Friday. One advantage with this calcium pad is that the bandage doesn't need to be changed every other day as with the moist bandage or white lotion. As long as Izzy doesn't damage the bandage, the medicated pad will work for four days. We shall see!

Since Izzy was already there, he also got a dental exam. More on that tomorrow.