Hello! My name is Dorothee Gilmore, and I am an equine veterinarian practicing in beautiful St. Lawrence County, in northern New York. And when I say "northern", I mean it. Like, the
REAL UPSTATE NY! Forget Albany, WE are located NORTH of the Adirondacks, with Canada just across the river! The area is beautiful, rural, and full of my favorite animals - horses! And I get to work my dream job: one of the most fun, exciting, challenging, exhausting, at times frustrating, but more often incredibly gratifying professions in the world! I have wanted to be a horse vet since at least the age of 11, when I realized that riding horses for a living wasn't going to be as much fun as I had imagined. So I somehow made it through vet school, and after a few detours ended up with my own practice, dedicated to the care of horses, ponies, and donkeys.
As anyone who knows me will attest to, I am a fairly opinionated person, and I like to tell a good story. So, while I have calmed down quite a bit as I have gotten older, I still at times get on a soap box and start to rant, or rummage around my trunk of stories from the "battle field". My plan for this blog is to tell a few of those stories, occasionally rant about something horsey that gets me hot under the collar, and hopefully explain some of the more complicated diseases and conditions that I see frequently in my patients, and that regularly get my clients very confused when they try to get advice from Dr. Google and Betty's cousin on Facebook. Don't get me wrong: I google a lot of stuff myself, and over the years have learned much from farmers, farriers, fools, and the Universe in general. But. BUT! (climbs on tack trunk and takes a deep breath) JUST BECAUSE YOUR HORSE HAS STARTED TO STUMBLE DOES NOT MEAN IT HAS EPM, EVEN IF YOUR SECOND COUSIN'S HORSE DID THE SAME THING AND HAD TO BE EUTHANIZED!!! It could. But it could also have navicular syndrome, cervical (neck) arthritis, or sore hocks, to name just a few. Call your veterinarian to have your horse checked out. Really. By allowing us to help us to help your horse soon after problems arise we are much more likely to be able to achieve great results with fairly low-intensity intervention. The longer inflammation and degeneration go on, the worse the pain and the less treatable the condition become. (breathes out, steps off the tack trunk)
And of course here's the ever necessary disclaimer: nothing written in this blog should be interpreted as diagnosing a disease or treatment advice. CALL YOU VETERINARIAN FOR THAT! Also, I will try my best not to offend too many people in my writings. If you feel offended I a) apologize in advance and b) ask you to leave me a polite comment, explaining to me why I offended you and letting me know what I can do to un-offend you. Or, c), you could just not read what I write, that's always an option. Anyone who gets nasty, abusive, or otherwise unacceptable gets blocked, booted, and cursed to forever have dog doo stuck under their boot. There!