Preventative Maintenance
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Mar 4, 2011
"Horses are like Cars"....Preventative maintenance for your horse is like making sure that the oil in your car gets changed. If you don't do it as scheduled, pretty soon it will catch up with you!
How often do you change the oil in your car? Is it every 3000 miles or 3 months? My car tells me when to change my oil. Do you get the gold plan when you get the oil changed? You know the one where they check all 2000 parts of the car. Or do you just do the basic plan where they only change your oil and not look at everything else?
We are not so lucky with our horses; unlike cars, they don't tell us to vaccinate preventatively. When we find out our horse has a problem, it is too late for vaccines to work. Most infectious diseases in the horse can be prevented with a simple vaccine. If they are losing weight, have a poor haircoat or are developing immune deficiencies; they can't ask for help. With timely examinations, proper vaccines, and dewormers given in the appropriate intervals, with correct dosage, we can help you keep your horse healthy.
I hear from owners all of the time, "I buy my vaccines and dewormers in the catalog or at the feed store". 75% of all people that vaccinate their own horses do it incorrectly. Are you in the 25% that do it right or are you in the 75% that think they do it right? What are you missing by doing vaccines yourself? You are missing the veterinarian. We are trained to observe and report any findings we see on the horse. When we administer a vaccine or dewormer, we are there to do the gold plan for you. We perform a medical examination on all "2000 parts". We examine your horse from nose to tail. By allowing us to observe your horse, we can hopefully catch a problem before it catches up with you.
If you have questions on what preventative maintenance to do for your horse, feel free to call or write us at Conley and Koontz Equine Hospital.