Re: Tied Up

["Susan Garlinghouse" <suendavid@worldnet.att.net>]

Since Dr. Ralston is out of town, I can just pass on what I'm being taught
in vet school pathology, plus a smattering from what I've read in the
research journals.  First, there's increasing evidence that really high
enzyme levels (those are the AST/SGOT, CK, and LDH numbers) may be normal
for endurance horses in *some* cases without necessarily indicating severe
muscle damage.  I'm not saying your horse didn't tie up, but how severely he
tied up might be mediated by how many miles he went *before* he tied up.
The research is indicating that these enzymes accumulate as simply a
by-product of prolonged exercise, and while those levels would be a big
warning flag in a TB that just galloped for two miles, they may not always
be the voice of doom in an endurance horse that just trotted along for 50
miles.  Just some food for thought, so you shouldn't necessarily panic JUST
because the enzymes are high---part of it might just be a function of how
far he'd already gone.

The high phosphorus, couldn't tell ya, but I personally doubt it's anything
to get too excited about (keeping in mind I won't be a DVM for another few
years!), Sarah can tell you when she's back in town.  Might be a function of
what the horse is eating, ie a high-phosphorus ration from bran, grain, etc.

I can tell you what the other abbreviations stand for:
MCV = mean corpuscular volume, or the size of the red blood cells in a
sample.
MCHC = mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentration
RDW, dunno.

There might be something else that MCV and MCHC are used for, but as far as
I know, they're most commonly used to identify anemia in an animal, and
whether it's a chronic bleeding problem, ie from parasites or something like
that.  If there's a chronic loss of blood, then the bone marrow will try to
keep up by releasing more and more new red blood cells from the marrow.  If
the demand is greater than the supply, the marrow starts releasing immature
red blood cells---baby blood cells are bigger than mature blood cells, thus
the measuring of volume---they want to see if these are adult or baby blood
cells.

In any case, according to the reference ranges they've given us, both of
these parameters are within normal ranges for your horse, so I wouldn't
worry about those.  If your muscle enzyme values are falling as well, then
that's good news as well.

Not a complete answer, but hope it's a help.

Susan G
Student of poking animals with sharp, pointy things

----- Original Message -----
From: <Mateef@aol.com>
To: <RIDECAMP@endurance.net>
Sent: Tuesday, August 22, 2000 9:04 AM
Subject: RC: Tied Up


> I need help.  My horse is the one horse who tied up at the National Champ.
I
> just now got the blood work.  Had the office fax it to me.  I have not yet
> talked to my vet.  He ran the blood that was collected the evening of the
tie
> up as well as blood from 9 days later (after we were home for 5 days).
The
> SGOT from immediately post tie up was 14,724 (that's NOT a misprint) the
SGOT
> from 9 days later was down to 5,676. ALT/SGPT from tie up day was 1,037
and 9
> days later was 177.  I understand we've got a ways to go before these
numbers
> get back to normal but I'm concerned about 5 other numbers.
> Phosphorus   9.0
> LDH         499
> MCV         50.8
> MCHC        36.3
> RDW         19.6
>
> Anything I need to really worry about?  Hard to tell when my vet is going
to
> be in touch and I'm tired of waiting.  What should I be doing?/ not doing?
>
> Horse seems well and comfortable.
>
> Thanks in advance
> Sallie and Matty (what is all this fuss about?)
>
>
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