Welcome to this episode of the webinar vet entitled The Needle Shy Horse, some practical and Safe Strategies to injection. I am Matthew Sinnovich. I'm a specialist equine surgeon and lay clinician at the Lippoch Eine Hospital, and that is based in Hampshire in the United Kingdom.
In clinical practise, we have all come across horses and some cheeky ponies who are averse to having injections or other things, be that for sedation, vaccination, and others. Hopefully, in this webinar, we'll be able to cover some safe strategies and some techniques to help, give some hints and tips to get the job done, in the least stressful ways possible. Some of our learning outcomes are listed up here, and we'll be covering all of these through the talk.
Note the bottom one, the Hail Mary. There are some hints and tips, which hopefully will, you'll find useful. So, let's get into it.
The most practical and safe strategy for injecting a needle shy horse is to ask a friendly intern. But those are hard to find and expensive to keep. So.
I'll tell you a little story instead. A long, long time ago in a land far away, there was a young and bright faced, bushy-tailed newly grad vet. Let's call him Matt.
That's a pseudonym, of course. Matt had ridden horses all of his life and wanted nothing more than to be the best surgeon in the whole world. He set about this task with great enthusiasm and vigour, taking on every challenge, and very soon he learned.
That a horse is dangerous at both ends and uncomfortable in the middle. We'll come back to Matt and his ventures later. But for now, let's get on to some of the good stuff.
So, why is dealing with difficult behaviour important and through this talk, we're not just gonna talk about . The injections, we'll talk about some other behaviours and use different behaviours as examples. But I think the, we'll get into some learning theory and, some coping mechanisms and things like that as well, and some different, variations.
But basically, when horses are being difficult, when they're, they're displaying dangerous. There are a number of things we need to take into account, and that is, of course, the safety of the patient, the safety of the handler, the safety of yourself. We also want to try, where possible, to make these events as least stressful for the horse and for the client, and for yourself.
We also want to get the job done, and I think that's a very important thing and something that we'll circle back to at the end. And we want to do that, obviously, while. Maintaining course welfare, person welfare, and meaning that next time we come, we can do the job again.
So, in 2020, Gemma Pearson, who we'll reference quite a lot through here, conducted a survey and found that about 95% of equines, vets, and people working with horses had, dealt with difficult horses on more than a monthly basis. 81% of them had sustained an injury, and it, and that was at least in the last 5 years. So just think back, how many of you have been injured by a difficult course, and that's not just serious injuries and, injuries causing, missing work and and miss and time off, as well as therapy and, and medical expenses, but also, you know, minor ones that just, are niggly and put us in a bad mood and just stop us from being very effective at work.
Here's another survey run by Beaver, through EVE and this looked at a total of 2,292 injuries, which were reported by the 620 respondents. And that equated to one injury every 3 years and 7 months. So, you know, that, that's a, that's a lot of, of, of downtime in the, in the industry.
. The worst or most worst injuries occurred while the veterinary surgeon was conducting some of the most common reasons for equine exam. Frequent sites of the worst injury were the leg into the head, and obviously you've spent a lot of time getting all the knowledge and looking after your head. And traumatic head injuries are a really, really big problem.
It, it's particularly in veterinary science. And the main cause of these is, as we, we can kind of expect, was being kicked with a hind leg. Of all reports, 33% of injuries resulted in a hospital admission, and 43% of those hospital admissions were for longer than 24 hours.
And 7% of those had resulted in a loss of consciousness. Now that's quite a severe injury and a very significant thing to, to be aware of, particularly as we're working with these animals frequently. So horse behaviour is a recognised risk in practise and Other behaviours that cause a problem are obviously being bargy or or pushy horses, won't stand still.
Horses that are needle shy, horses that are head shy, horses that are clipper shy, and then as we've said, those that kick out with the, the mostly with the hind legs. Now these stats come out of the, the first paper, the Pearson paper, and that's one that we'll reference as as we go along quite a lot. So, striking also was reported at about 50%, rearing at about 49%, refusing to enter stocks, again, sort of 49% biting, or refusing to enter an exam room, as you can see there on the right hand side.
So in the studies, how did these vets deal with these behaviours? And as you can imagine, probably all of you have tried one and all more of these things. Certainly ear twitching is not recommended, from a welfare point of view at all, but definitely nose twitching and neck twitching, are probably fairly commonly performed.
Lip chains, again, from a welfare point of view, not necessarily, . Advisable, but often more common, on the mainland in the States, using stocks and crushes, and certainly in a hospital, environment, we use those fairly frequently, attempting stable or trailer confinement in order to get the job done. Again, useful, but potentially, precarious by putting yourself into a very confined space with an animal that doesn't want to necessarily be there, attempting blindfolding, changing competent handlers, holding up a leg, or using food distraction.
Now I want you to think back to, to your own experiences here, and just see, you know, in, in your experience, how often do you think these techniques work? And do they, do they work for you? I think we can all tend to gauge.
The ones who we can distract with food, often the sort of cheeky looking native pony, who has been distracted with food quite a lot. Often sort of just the slightly anxious ones by lifting a limb or having a competent, calm handler can can mitigate a lot of these problems. Not the biggest fan of blindfolding in case anything can happen.
But. Hopefully you might also have thought, you know, what else can work instead of these, and that's where we'll get onto to some of the solutions hopefully in this, in this talk. Now I'm gonna talk for a little bit about PPE because I think while these things aren't necessarily going to stop accidents from happening, what they may do is mitigate some of the injuries and the bad outcomes associated with them.
Now, . Obviously, we all know about looking after your feet, A, because you, you need to walk on them all day. You don't want sore feet at the end of it.
But also, you know, having horses stand on toes and broken toes, were a, were a big problem in those, in those surveys, and certainly a, a, a big risk factor for missing work and extended periods of, of time off. So, sturdy. Boots and potentially metal toe caps as well.
Very vital part of of PPE. And then, the other thing we have there is a helmet. Now, this has been a slightly controversial topic with some vets.
It is now becoming far more accepted, and that's through, . Generally through the equine industry, through some hard work of top riders, and sort of industry leaders, as well as in the veterinary part as well, it's, it's becoming a far more accepted practise to. Wear hats in and around horses, I think.
It was some of the older vets and certainly some of the older generation felt like if they wore a hat, they were admitting weakness around owners, whereas I think owners are now far more accepting of the dangers of being in and around horses and working around horses, and I don't think it's, it's any bad thing to reach for your crash cap, when you need it. In fact, it's probably a very wise thing, and I would definitely advocate it. So that partners who are the body that own a large number of practises and certainly own us here at Lipo or our parent company, they've taken on the challenge of changing some of the stigma and the resistance to the uptake of wearing head protection.
This was rolled out as part of a campaign to promote the use of protective headgear, for all potentially dangerous procedures. So, realistically, anything, involving a horse. It went under the banner of hathead, just don't care.
And to be honest, if this has saved one severe head injury, it will definitely have been worthwhile. Certainly in our hospital, people who are handling horses, on trot-ups in clinics, etc. Are required to wear hats at all times.
We've also gone so far as to implement gloves as well when trotting up horses, lunging horses, and obviously, footwear, as, as we said. Now, having spoken to a number of clinicians about their preference for, for headgear, many are, as I said, remain resistant to wearing headgear for a number of reasons. But interestingly, those who have had head injuries or had very close near misses, tend to become very quick adopters of these.
There are a couple of different, Examples here, so the one on the left, Barta, who make very good adjustable helmets, so they're quite comfy, they're breathable. They don't necessarily protect your face. There are some visors that can come down to protect your eyes.
There are some clinicians who use cricket helmets with a full face mask like this. The issue with those is that they may restrict your peripheral vision and mean that you can't see a flinch or a kick coming, but if it does come and it does get you, you're probably more likely to be protected. They are quite cumbersome and they do take some adapting and getting used to to using, and certainly, certainly because of their size, they can look quite quite daunting.
But once you get used to them, actually you've, you hardly notice that they're even there. Another variation may be an ice hockey helmet. This has a nice clear visor, and this may mitigate some of the, Some of the, the, the issues that the other health problems.
But what you don't want to do is spook your horses or your nurses, and certainly you shouldn't use one of these if your name is Jason. So let's get into it a little bit and look at why do we think that these behaviours, so aversive behaviours occur. Horses essentially have no ability to solve problems.
They learn by trial and error. They have excellent long-term memory, but tend to have very poor short term memory. So once a habit has become entrenched, it's often very difficult to get over that.
We're gonna talk about some positive and negative conditioning, and before we get into that, I want to just say a word about behaviour and the terms that we use when we're talking about behaviour and conditioning. Now we naturally think of positive and negative conditioning in terms of praise and punishment, with praise being positive and aversive stimuli or punishment being negative. I think it's more helpful to think of these two terms in a more mathematical way.
So positive reinforcement should be the thought of an addition, so a desired thing or a reward, and negative reinforcement is the removal of something that the horse doesn't like. So an aversive stimulus, which in itself is a reward. So, if you think of it as, particularly when you're reading about, if you do any reading in and around this topic, when people are talking about positive and negative conditioning.
Positive generally is the addition of something to the situation, negative is the removal of. Something from the situation. Both of those are reward-based, so the reward sometimes is the removal of something the horse doesn't like, and that would be negative conditioning, whereas positive conditioning may be the addition of a reward, so that may be a treat or a lick or or something like that.
And both of these can achieve the, the desired behaviour as we'll see in a little bit. So how horses learn, they learn by testing, as we said, they, and how their behaviour influences an outcome. So this is known as operant conditioning.
Positive reinforcement, as we said, is the addition of something pleasant, which makes a response more likely to be repeated. So that's a treat or a reward. And negative reinforcement is the removal of a stimulus which makes a response more likely in the future.
So if a horse doesn't want to go into a room, or something like that, you may give them a treat which may lure them in, or if they're pulling against a, a head collar when they're going into a room, removing the pressure from the head collar often is a reward, which is the, the desired behaviour that they want. And sometimes that can lead them to actually the desired outcome that you want. So, we're gonna use clippers or clipping here, just as an example, but this is the same process for most aversions that that horses develop.
So why do horses learn to be clipper shy? It may be the noise, it may be a previous bad experience, it may be the tickling or the vibration or the pulling on the hair that they don't like. The horse has learned the bad behaviour and gotten away with it.
So what happens there? Clippers are brought out and that starts the stress response. Clippers are turned on.
The horse reacts, looks tense and unsure, but generally, the person is focusing on the job at hand, doesn't see the behaviour in the horse. They walk up to the horse and place the clippers in and or on around the horse. The horse then reacts, it rears, it bites, it kicks, it pulls back.
The clippers are removed. From the horse during their behaviour and that behaviour is then reinforced. So this here is a very classical example of negative reinforcement, where you've presented in a stimulus to the horse, which they don't like.
They have shown aversive behaviour and the stim has been removed, so the negative effect has has happened there. And that then reinforces the behaviour. So I think that is something to think of when you are preparing to deal with young horses, when you're preparing to deal with needle shy horses, is that every time.
The horse wins, or every time the stimulus, not, not wins, every time the stimulus is removed, that behaviour is reinforced. And as we said, short term memory is not great in horses, but long term memory really is. So that keeps being entrenched in them and they keep reinforcing the that behaviour.
So, be mindful of the situation. The best advice I ever received in my first job was to read the room. And this has been helpful with both horses and people.
With needle shine horses, it's important to determine if the horse is genuinely scared and what's driving that reaction. Many horses are not actually sensitive to the needle, but have had adverse interactions with vets, and that is more of the problem. So they see what looks like a vet and they react.
The farrier can often go to pick up their legs, but when you go to pull up, they go nuclear, and once you know where you stand, you can then formulate an approach and plan an end goal safely. So I think understanding how you think the horse is gonna react and predetermining that and predicting it often means you can then change things safely and have a, a positive long-term outcome. So when dealing with needle shy horses or reverse of horses, I really see two approaches, a short term and a long-term situation.
In the short term, you need to vaccinate Bob the cop, so you can get onto your next call, but Bob has other plans. In the long term, you want to keep doing the job you love and the job that you trained so hard to do for such a long time. And not let Bob the cop get you down and cause you mental health issues, literally and figuratively.
In the first instance here we have 3 strategies, so sedation, restraint and distance from the situation. The long term solutions require owner compliance and may require more specialist intervention, but these are the things that are gonna be able, that you're gonna have to hopefully get into place that will mean that in time, Bob the cob will hopefully cope with these aversive behaviours. You'll both have strategies that are acceptable to you and that long term you can keep doing what you want to do.
Bob the cob can keep doing what he wants to do, and we have happy owners, horses and vets. So, starting with sedation, the question is, how do you get this into that? Alpha 2 adreno receptor agonists have essentially changed the face of E1 work and become a vital part of our practise.
I never cease to be amazed by what we can do to horses and what they will tolerate us with when they're under the influence of various alpha 2 sedatives and a little bit of local anaesthesia. But we do need to be able to administer them and administer them at a correct dose in order for them to have the the desired effect and for in order for us to get through to the procedure that we need to do. Unfortunately, most of the alpha 2s are absorbed by the mucosa.
And because of this, domiciin comes in an oromucosal gel. Now the important bit here is mucosal. They can't eat this and have you expect the same reaction.
The drug does need to coat the lining of the mucosa. So. Some horses don't mind being pasted but do mind being injected.
And I'm sure many of you would have tried Domo gel in some instance. Again, very important, as we said, mucosal absorption. So be sure not to get it in your eyes, don't get it in your mouth.
And the same thing for owners, if you're handing it out to them, do be cautious, and explain the risks as it's going. But if you can get it under the tongue, over the tongue, and into the mucosa, that is very, very useful. Now horses that don't like to be pasted er or are aversive to or head shy around the mouth, many of them will accept a bit, most of them are bittered, certainly older horses indeed.
And that's where things like this and equine dosing bit is very, very useful. These are something that you can, get your owners to buy, something that you can have in the car. And if you can put that on with a head collar, you can then, pre-sedate them with some Domo, or you can get some aceromazine in oral preparation or something like that.
In feed prior to applying the bit. And then you can administer the domo gel, which will then get onto the, mucosa because they will have the same sort of reaction to a bit where they will chew and salivate, and that will then coat the oral lining and the oral mucosa and then make sure that it has an effect. Do make sure that you are patient when applying these.
They do take time to work and you need to give them sufficient time in order for that to have the if desired effect. Now, again, as we said, alpha 2 adrenal receptor agonists do have mucosal absorption, and this applies to other drugs as well. So, Shanazine or xylazine, also has oral and mucosal absorption.
Domosine itself, so the, the injectable variation has absorption. And if you don't have access to Domo gel or if you're out in the yard and something has gotten. Difficult.
You can use the original formulations through an oromucosal, application, but you are gonna need a much higher dosage. These aren't necessarily published or reported, but probably what you're talking about is at least 2 to 3 times the the the dose that you would usually use, onto an oral mucosal surface. So, the eyes, and we'll get on to some other things, as we go through.
Again, they will take more time to be absorbed and to have an effect, but often what they do is just give you enough of effect that you can then er get close enough to get a needle in or some sort of strength. So, I really put my hand up and acknowledge that most of the success I've had with handling difficult horses has come from a team of people who can work well together and listen and interact with a common goal. So a a good handler on the, on the head of the horse is absolutely crucial.
And usually on the road, you end up with Mrs. Jones in her slip-ons, hanging on to the end of Bob and chatting about the latest episode of Below deck, and that's less than ideal. Which is why I would always advocate if you are dealing with a known difficult horse, that you have a handler that you know and trust come out with you, particularly when handling these difficult cases.
This absolutely includes having a head collar that fits and is secure. And then there are various other forms of restraint listed here, which are used with varying levels of success. Again, the importance of having taken stock of and working out, taking stock of the situation and working out if the horse will tolerate any of these prior to giving them a go is absolutely vital.
Putting a nose twitch on a mildly stressed horse may release some endorphins and calm them down, but putting it on a stimulated and extremely fearful horse may cause one of those sort of nuclear reactions. Now, not everyone will have access to knockdown boxes or padded crushers. But certainly, if you do have access to those, do use them.
And the same thing, getting into neck twitches and, and normal twitches and muzzles, it does depend very much on the situation. And they aren't necessarily recommended guidelines to all of these, but, . Having awareness of all of the options and trying different things does mean that you can tease out which ones will work for your specific cases and get a bit of an experience as to which ones will work with your specific cases.
So the last short term solution that we cover here really is distance, and I don't mean getting in your car and leaving at pace. When I was a student, I treated a camel who came in with its own handler. Having never been through camel handling at university, I, politely asked the groom where I should stand, that I would be safe, if the camel tried to get me.
His reply was outside the building. So that gives you an idea of the distance required for 2. Some of these patients.
But these extensions here are ones that we use in the hospital for blocking the distal limbs in some needle shy horses or for getting a local lab in at the site of an injection, and properly needle reactive horses. So as you see on the one end, there's a lurelock that the needle fits into, so you're unlikely to lose a sharp and a bed. And then there's about 1 metre or so of place you can inject and safely get out the way while Bob jumps up and down and stamps.
Then you can attach your syringe onto the end and jet through it, and make sure that you are a safe distance away. Also means if they're swinging legs or swaying, you've got some play to, to manoeuvre as well. Very, very, very useful and definitely something that I would advocate the use of.
The other thing is that even for non-reactive horses, it means that if the needle's in place, it's got a little bit of play on it and it doesn't move out of the structure you've, you've stuck it into. In really difficult cases where repeat injections are needed, getting them sedated orally, then blebbing, and getting an extension in may then allow you to get a catheter in. I'd always advocate, getting an extension onto this if you've got a needle shy horse.
This means you can. From the other side of the horse, and sometimes that's all that it takes is they're used to you injecting on the left, and just changing sides and approaching them from the other side is something all they need. Failing that, you can also get them from outside a stable or a similar safe distance away.
Some other distance strategies, sometimes doing it over a stable door, horses are not used to necessarily being injected over the stable door, so they don't necessarily have that preconceived conception that that is a problem. And you can treat them over the door, practise some of the things we'll talk about later, but also just get the, get the job done over the stable door. If they do then stamp or barge, you have a physical barrier between you as well.
. As long as Bob can be held safely over the door, this is an option. If not in some very, very bad cases, I have backed up horses to a window or walked past one, or had a horse walking past one, and these are options. Do be very, very careful if you are doing this, not to get your.
Caught or crushed in the attempt to do this. And sometimes it's useful to have the horse with the handler in the stable, bring them up to the, the window, and then you can access them like that. Many stables have this sort of design, and it's a useful thing to, have if you, if you need to.
Long term solutions are generally something that require a bit of experience and maybe some specialist help. And I, it's definitely something that I think all horse vets should know about and should probably have some experience with. There's some great resources out there.
Gemma Pearson, as we said, is. Is one of the mainstays in, equine behaviour, and in solutions for managing difficult behaviour in horses. I definitely recommend that you read her work, if you have any interest in this, even if you don't have any interest in it, just for your own self-preservation, these sorts of, of articles are very useful and come with some very, Good little hints and tips of, of how to deal with things.
Gemma herself is very approachable and you can always contact her for advice directly as well. So, Beaver had a great initiative to educate vets as well as owners about behavioural issues, and these are available online, and I would definitely encourage any of you who have owners of needle shy horses or difficult aversive horses. To look at these resources, they're, you know, 5 minute little clips and how not to, to avoid breaking your vet, and I think they're, they're very useful and they're a good start to get start the conversation and to show them what options there are and get them to buy into those options.
And that hopefully then long term means that you have a happier horse and a happier vet. And a more successful outcome for for Bob the cob. OK, so coming back to our previous example of aversion, the Clippershy horse, let's see what we can do to change that sort of behaviour.
And this is basically the, the cycle that we, we go through, so the, the behavioural modification. So clippers are brought out and your stress response is started, you wait for the horse to react or to relax once it has reacted, and then you reinforce that with food scratches or some positive reinforcement. Show the horse the clippers are not turned on.
If the horse is relaxed, reinforce the treat. Wait for the horse to be relaxed with the clippers, treat if they touch the clippers. Touch the horse with the clippers turned off.
Treat when they're relaxed. Turn the clippers on, wait for that relaxed state again, treat, and so you move forward until you can actually clip a small patch, and then again reward as you go. Now, we'll show a little kind of case study as as we go through this.
This we have permission to use from one of our clients. This video will show one of our nurses, Philippa Pritchard. We have a number of nurses who are trained in some behavioural, things.
Philippa's a great nurse and, does a lot of work for Project nurse, if that's something else you're interested in. And there's some great resources again to help your nurses. So training up your handlers as well makes your life much better.
And just having these sorts of, of solutions is also always useful. So this, is some positive reinforcement of Matilda here. She was, this shows you her clicker training our now ex Needle shy horse Matilda.
Let's see if this works. So now in this case, the horses had positive reinforcement. And the needles introduced to the clicker and treating.
Yeah. So you wait for the reaction to stop. And then, so this is kind of the cycle that we showed earlier.
So you have both positive and negative reinforcement here. You have the positive stimulus with the treat, and then the negative reinforcement with removal once the, behaviours tolerated and associated with the truth. So why do people advocate the use of a clicker and, and what's good about it?
For positive reinforcement to be used successfully, you have to give the, the treat or the, the reward as close to the desirable behaviour as possible. This is not always very practical, so the clicker in essence is just a bridge to the food as it's a much quicker response than physically getting the food to them. So the actual sound becomes the positive reward, but the horse must understand that what the clicker is before it can be effective as a training aid.
And I think that's one of the downfalls of clicker training is that many people use a clicker and a reward system but don't get the timing right. So how do you get started using a clicker, and here's another video. So there you have Philippa just showing that the clicker is a reward itself.
So lots and lots of positive reinforcements, neck scratches on this young horse a click, and as soon as they look for the click, you give them a reward. And what you'll see as you go through this video here, every time she clicks, the horse looks around and is now looking for the click for a treat, so you have a very positive response to the click, and that means you can then move on to the next step, which essentially is shaping. Now, you need to be realistic about the behaviour and break down the task you need to achieve into manageable steps.
This was basically the, the process that we used with Matilda, and shaping is the act of taking baby steps to create the desired response. So basically with her, she reared when her neck was touched, and we then got her to rearing when the hand was still on the neck, rearing when fingers were pressed into the neck, and then only rearing when the skin was pinched. So, we use some negative reinforcement and again remember negative reinforcement is the removal of something unpleasant, sometimes referred to as pressure released.
So, this can be used very effectively to get patients to, Load into a clinic or something like that. And also to just accept having a needle or something on their neck. So you hold pressure, any forward movement release the pressure and then you treat and click, hold the pressure again and repeat until you're having the, the desired response.
So here is an example of the negative reinforcement being used to load a horse into a clinic. You'll see here this horse has quite a lot of pressure being placed. It doesn't like that at all.
And you'll see what we do is then use some negative reinforcement. And then and then like. Philippa will release the pressure off the horse.
Give some positive encouragement over there. The release of pressure is a reward and the horse then loads into the clinic. So With those sorts of things in mind, have a think about how you would, deal with aversions to some other common bad behaviours.
So, having made syringed, which is a problem when when you need to, deworm, rearing when led, or unwillingness to pick up feet. And often those are the first signs pre . Becoming a needle shy horse, and these are things you can give to owners to work on, and generally what it means is that you have a an all round more compliant horse that you can get closer to before you're even sticking a needle into them.
So syringing meds, hold the syringe near the horse, just holding it, not fighting, just in a very relaxed way, wait for the horse to relax, reward, hold the syringe close to the mouth, wait for the horse to relax, and then reward. And here it is. An example of that.
So you can see this horse is already conditioned to the clicker and. Now is having a very positive experience by the syringe coming near it. You can see as soon as it clicks, the eye flicks and it's looking for the treat.
Again, another positive response. And some negative reinforcement by having the the stimulus taken away. And the final reward.
So, same sort of thing with picking up feet. Yeah And many of these horses are very, very intelligent, and that's why they've learned to get away with the the behaviour that they have. They know what they can and can't do.
And I think giving them a different outlet and just changing their mind about things is often a very useful way forward. So, while emotional responses to stimuli can be changed, remember that we said the memories associated with those stimuli can essentially never be erased. Horses have very, very good long-term memories.
So, for example, a horse's emotional response to fear when faced with an injection can be changed, but the memories of being afraid during previous injections can't. So this is a lifelong practise that they need to be engaged with, . If you're trying to train fear out of a prey animal, the golden rule of training in this situation is introduce everything in small steps, that's what we call shaping, that every horse can understand and accept the concepts and never frighten any horse at any time along this this this way.
Wherever possible, as we always say, prevention is better than cure, and taking time and ensuring your clients are educated to handle their foals and their horses from the beginning and allocating more time when you're dealing with young animals or foals so the procedures are not rushed and are handled in a calm, happy environment will pay dividends for you and your successors for years and years and years to come. . There is again some very good literature on how to do this and where to go.
this is in the EVJ and again Gemma Pearson on. Starting sports horses with the right experience, this goes more into more than just behaviour. This has to do with a lot of exercise and training and and other things as well.
But certainly behaviour and the aversive behaviours do play into this and it's all, all kind of wrapped up in, in. One package, you can't necessarily tease the the two things out. So, having well educated owners while it's, it's more difficult and more effort upfront, long term will make your life much better.
And you'll also have owners who are happy with your services and are far more loyal for a long time. Now, those are all ideal world scenarios, but sometimes you just have to get the job done and you don't have any other options. So here are a couple of the sort of best tips and hints and trips, tips for the very, very needle shy horses and the ones who already have a lot of those established fear processes going on.
I think. With a lot of these horses, you have one go, and you need to know exactly what you're going to do and have everything ready to get it done. Many of these horses have previously kind of just been stabbed with a needle and sometimes doing things like changing the pressure, so not necessarily a stabby pressure, but a firm pressure, they will be far more comfortable with, will mean that you can get close enough to actually perform the, the injection.
I have already touched on changing sides. Many horses are so used to being approached from the left hand side and having everything done from one side that purely by changing the situation up and approaching them from a different side, changes their whole experience, and it may be just as simple as that when you are . Doing the injection, a firm pressure with a quick stroke, but not stabby, and I don't know how to explain that other than than a physical feel, but something for you to think about as, as you're doing it.
And the other thing I always advocate to students, interns, other vets is always keep one hand on the horse. Your fingers are exceptionally sensitive and they will alert your brain to the horse tensing up and all sorts of things long before your eyes and the sound and everything else will. Also, if you have one hand on a horse and it barges into you, that momentum is gonna push you out the way and you're less likely to get trapped under them, bitten by them or kicked.
So having. Contact on the horse at all times with your fingers, particularly while your brain is distracted with other things like drawing up meds or where am I gonna put my needle, what am I gonna do, just gives you that mental feedback and those couple of milliseconds prior to a horse going nuclear means that you're out the way and much more safe and, and hopefully don't have a traumatic injury associated with the whole situation. So the weird, the wonderful and the Hail Mary shots.
I have used intranasal domain, so not the gel, but the injectable, and gotten that done through mucosal absorption. I have also used rectal application, backing a horse up to a stable door, and using some dermo gel rectally. Ice to desensitise the skin, .
Cold enough and long enough that they don't actually feel the the needle for a bleb. ELA cream or lidocaine cream, as we said, putting them in a horse box gives you a partition between you and a horse. Some of them tolerate that quite well.
Again, it changes their perception and changes their . Their perception of the whole situation, they often aren't expecting it, so you can often get away with it that way. And then things like flooding and distraction, so there are other types of distraction, not just food from tapping on their forehead, creating noises, all sorts of, of other things.
They often can't give enough focus on to what you're doing if you can distract them with something else. I have had one horse that we could only vaccinate and saddle, and it did involve a lot of countering around the field to get the flu jab in, but it was successful. So there, there are many different ways to skin a cat, as they say, or to inject a difficult horse, and these may just be something that you can use to get the job done while you are spending the time on some opening condition and shaping.
Failing that, there is the opportunity for really, really dangerous and really, really feral horses. There are commercially available pole syringes, and in certain instances we have used these. They are very, very effective and again provide the distance to safety.
Horses often aren't expecting the, the pole to have a sting, so they don't mind it. You can desensitise them to a pole first, and then use the pole syringe. And then, obviously, darting and things like that.
But that, that's a very, very specialist situation and certainly not something I'd be advocating to, to every practitioner. So what became of our fairy tale vet? Matt went on to have many adventures and battled many dragons, also known as Welsh ponies on this island.
He accepted many challenges and using some of the hints and tips I've shared here, he had some great success too. However, he couldn't outrun epidemiology, and he too became a statistics. Couple of broken wrists, a smashed toe, and a bilaterally plated plateau fracture later.
He shared some of the, probably the most important bit of advice with me ever. It's not your horse, and if there is no safe way to perform the injection or the procedure, you can and should decline. No one's gonna praise you for being a hero and getting hurt, cause all it means is they have to cover your weekend on call.
And I think this is a conversation that we don't want to have with owners, but sometimes we just can't get it done. And it's not your fault, and it's not anyone's fault, except maybe the horses and the owners for letting them get into that situation. But self-preservation and human health and safety must always come first.
There recently was a very well publicised case in the states of a well-known, very experienced equine vet who was called in to handle a very wild and unbroken, or castrate a very wild and unbroken youngster. To be fair, a lot of the things he did were probably not right. .
But what ultimately happened is that there was so much backlash on social media and so much . Outcry about it, that the vet himself took his own life. And ultimately that's not a situation any of us ever want to be in.
A, we never want to be in a dangerous situation. B, we never want to be filmed doing something dangerous, and C, we never want to have to feel that there is no way out. So I think the other part of this is, as I said, self-preservation and ensuring that you are safe and having a long term.
Career and something that you can be proud of is very, very important, so don't be afraid to just say, hey, put your hands up and say this is dangerous, it's dangerous for your horse, it's dangerous for me, it's dangerous for you. Let's stop, let's get some advice, let's regroup and let's do this in a way that is sustainable and manageable. Another great initiative just to touch on before we end, not one more vet, which, tackles some of the mental health issues, .
Associated with the veterinary profession, particularly when you're dealing with needle shy horses and grumpy owners, and time pressures and all of that. So something again for some self-preservation and just to think of, as you're out there, do go onto their website. There are some great resources and things there, and it's beyond the remit of, of this talk now, but just that you are aware about these things, I'm sure you are.
These are some of the papers that we have referenced, in the talk. So for some, some learning, if you want to go learn about equine learning theory and how to practically apply some of the things through equine learning theory, the in practise articles by Gemma Pearson are very, very useful. That's enough from me today, thank you very much for your attention.
I hope you've enjoyed and please join us again soon.
