 So today is our third NDSU extension horse management webinar. It's the third of four in this series and we are going to talk about emergency first aid and more so emergency first aid before the veterinarian arrives. So what can we do in an emergency situation before our vet shows up? The presenters today are Rachel Wald and so Rachel is a previously accredited veterinary technician for seven years before she came to us in extension. Rachel is our NDSU A&R extension agent in McHenry County and so we appreciate her being here today and of course a horse owner as well. And then Paige Brumman has been with us in extension for I believe 13 years. Paige is also a horse owner and she's in Ward County as our egg and natural resource extension agent. And so I'm thrilled to have them both here talking to you guys today about emergency first aid for horses so you guys can take it away. Alright, thank you Mary for the introduction. I'm going to kick us off today and just talk a little bit about what we're going to go through first. So we're going to first talk about prevention and preparation. We're going to discuss having a first aid kit on hand and some items that you might want to include in your various first aid kits. We're going to talk about the importance of having that relationship with your veterinarian. We're going to visit about vital signs, what they are and how to collect them and what's normal. And then we're going to deal just a little bit about assessing that emergency situation and things that you can do to determine just how much of a pinch we're in and how soon we need to get that veterinarian there. So first let's talk about prevention and in a perfect world we'd like to say well if I do all of these steps A through Z my horse will never require emergency care. It'll never get hurt and that is just false. That is simply not true. So you can provide the best absolute care to your horse and emergencies still pop up. Injuries still occur, illness still occurs. However, we want to do what we can as horse owners to minimize these things. So one of the first things to think about is review your facilities. Oftentimes our horses require emergency care because they get injured in facilities that maybe could have had some maintenance or upkeep done to prevent that. So go home, go through your barn through your pastures or get into that springtime a year where we need to go and check all of our fences before we turn out onto our pasture in a couple of months. And do do diligence and go through and really look at those things to see where your horse could potentially become injured or entrapped and cause issues and and be diligent on trying to prevent that by fixing those ahead of time. Again, you can have the safest facilities that are top notch and still end up with problems. The other thing to remind yourself about is just horse behavior awareness, knowing how horses interact with each other. We often find that we end up with emergency situations when we're kind of switching those herd dynamics around. We're bringing new horses into the facility or we're taking horses away from the herd. Anytime that those animals get stressed, they seem to be more apt to end up injured or ill and need some emergency care. So being aware of their behavior is another thing. Maintaining regular veterinary care, having that horse in the best health condition as possible is also ideal. So keeping them up to date on a healthy balanced ration, visiting with your veterinarian about preventative care such as vaccinations and those items can help reduce the risk, but again, not totally eliminated. And then lastly, know what's normal for your horse because if you don't know what's normal, it's hard to know what's abnormal. And if you know when your horse is feeling a little off or something isn't quite right, you're more likely to be able to catch it early and prevent whatever condition illness or injury they have from getting worse. So keep prevention kind of at the top of your mind as we go through things today. Maybe be thinking about your horse in your facility and what you can do to minimize risk. Okay, so we already mentioned it's not necessarily if your horse is going to need emergency care at some point, it's more or less when. So you want to prepare and do your best to be ready to handle those emergencies when they pop up. So think, are you ready to travel at the drop of a hat or at moments noticed with your horse? And this is key in North Dakota and in rural state that we're in, because sometimes we're going to need to load up and go to our vet versus the vet being able to get to us. And sometimes it's a matter of what can be done quickest or how severe the condition of your horse is and that's a discussion that you have with your vet. So is your pickup and trailer ready to go at the drop of a hat? If you are maybe just hauling in the summer months, maybe it's not. Is your pickup and trailer snowed in? Does it have a big snow drift in front of it? Do you keep it maintained? Have you checked the tires, all of those trailer and pickup maintenance things to keep in mind? So if you're thinking of your rig right now and where it's at, can you get to it quickly, get it hooked up and get on the road in an emergency? The other thing is to have a list of trusted helpers, maybe both for you on your farm when your horse needs help and also maybe somebody that can come and take care of the horses that remain if you need to load up and go somewhere, okay? So you have that list of kind of trusted neighbors, trusted help family, other horse people that you'd be able to call to help you out in an emergency situation. The next one on the list is having that veterinary contact and that seems kind of obvious, but we're going to talk a little bit more about how intricate that can be. It's not maybe just having one contact but numerous contacts. So we'll visit more in depth, but making sure that you're aware of the vets that are in your area or in your region, in your state, and even your multiple state region so that you know your options that are out there in the case of an emergency. Is your first aid kit well-stocked? First of all, do you have a first aid kit? And then do you know what's in it? Is it well-stocked? Do you know how to use all of the items that are in that kit? So practicing those skills on a healthy horse is highly recommended and we're going to go through some of those a little bit more in depth, but do you know how to manage each of the issues that could pop up? Maybe not all of them, but the more common ones. How are you going to be able to handle that until we get that veterinary care? And then lastly, as far as preparing goes, try to stay optimistic and because you work through the prevention and you're preparing, feel optimistic in your skills that you're able to handle some of these emergencies that are going to come your way. Often, more often than not, we share some of the stories that don't go well. They seem to stick with us more and just remember that many more times we have injuries and emergencies that turn out for the better. Okay, so stay optimistic. Okay, let's get down to talking about a veterinary client patient relationship or commonly referred to as the VCPR and why that's important. We really need to establish that relationship before an emergency occurs. And to define what that looks like, it means that the vet has agreed to provide their expertise in medical judgment to you, the client or the horse owner. And you have agreed to follow their care instructions for that animal. This vet needs to have a sufficient knowledge of your animals and they're familiar with their care, their husbandry, their location, which typically for most vets means that they see you and your animals at least annually. They provided services and your horses have been under their care at least annually. That means maybe having vets that are doing regular care items for you and maybe that's one or multiple ones that you can be referred out to, but not just calling vets in a dire emergency need. Okay, so are they having their vaccinations, their health paperwork, their dental work, all of this preventative care? Do that when your horse is healthy, right? So you develop that relationship when you need your vet in an emergency. And then, you know, I need to talk about just briefly the fact that there's a equine vet shortage and that might not come as a surprise to you if you're in the state of North Dakota. We're very rural. There's a lot of livestock here and not a lot of vets. Okay, so sometimes your options are limited and that's why we're glad that you're here today to hopefully improve your skills and learn a few things that you can do to make your vets life easier and also to reduce that risk So how about higher success rate when your horse gets injured? And then lastly, you know, be aware of a false online advice. I know it's really easy to access information online and I certainly encourage everybody as a horse owner to look up that information and be prepared on some of the common emergencies that we have. But utilize, you know, our veterinary hospitals, our universities, our extension resources, establish equine vet clinics for that information versus blogs and social media accounts from individuals. So let's talk about our first aid kit. Every horse owner should have at least a basic first aid kit and you can really get into the weeds in first aid kits. So at a minimum, a basic kit with the items that we're going to talk about in future slides. You might also want to consider having an advanced kit and I would suggest an advanced kit if you have a large number of horses, if you are a significant distance from having a veterinarian be able to get to you or you being able to load up and go to a veterinarian. The small kits are really nice for minor problems. You probably want a small kit that you're going to throw in your trailer every time you load up and go somewhere. If you're trail riding all day long or you're away from home for many, many hours with your horse, something that you can throw in and take it when trail riding is also recommended. And then that full size kit for your home or your barn. And like I said, you can really get into a lot of items to put in this kit to where you're investing hundreds and hundreds and thousands of dollars into your first aid kit. And that's for you to decide how far you want to go and ask yourself those questions of how many horses do I have? How far away am I able to get these items when needed? The basic first aid kits that we're going to talk about are items that are just until you can get to emergency care. And by the time you get to that clinic or you're able to get to town and purchase the specific injury or illness items that you might need. Okay. The other thing to remember is replace them as we use them. So all too often we might rate our first aid kit for small little things and forget to replace them. And then we come back the next time and they're gone. So keep a inventory and replace as needed. The next one is climate specific. So anything that shouldn't freeze or get overheated. I recommend keeping in a smaller separate bag or something you can easily take out of your first aid kit and bring into the house or another climate controlled area. Because many of our medications and our different things that we have in there are liquids we don't want to freeze and we don't want them to get too hot in the summer. And then store these items in a waterproof, durable container. You're going to be carrying them back and forth to the barn and now the trailer, those sorts of things. So I've seen first aid kits in all different items. Rubbermaid totes, really durable ones with wheels that you can pull around and that might determine what you put them in might depend on the size of that kit as well. All right, so here we're going to go through the list of just general items that should be easily accessible to any horse owner. So we need that digital thermometer. Rachel's going to talk about vital signs and using that but digital thermometers are easy to acquire a couple bucks, have a few of them, make sure the batteries are working. You might need to check those regularly to make sure that they're still operational. Having exam gloves are important. So having a box or two of those around duct tape. There's so many options for that, right? Various sizes of syringes with or without needles, particularly oral syringes or those that can be used to flush out wounds and debris are key. An assortment of towels and rags. Having scissors on hand, particularly the bandage scissors with the blunt tip are recommended. A hoof pick or similar item. The flashlight, timer, pen and paper. That's something that a lot of us use on our phones these days and that's certainly acceptable to use that. You might want to consider if you don't use that or aren't comfortable using that on a cell phone to have those items in your kit as well. Again, with having those batteries charged, that's probably the tricky part. A clean bucket is essential for carrying items also for putting in liquids for you to flush out wounds and injuries. A pocket knife. Having a written list of emergency contacts. And again, this might be in your phone, but having that written list for somebody else that's coming to your operation or the kind of the first responder to that injury or illness, they might not have all the contacts that you have in your phone. So having that written out and printed in your emergency contacts is recommended. And then I also recommend having a first aid guideline. So there's, whether that's a book or some quick fact sheets on the common injuries and illnesses that we deal with. A vital signs chart so that you can remember all those numbers and statistics that Rachel's going to share with you as far as what's normal for your horse's vital signs. Twine, so many uses for that. And then ice packs or some other things. So those are just general items. Again, this isn't all inclusive. You could go on for many, many, many, many pages of items to put in your first aid kit. But these are just kind of the basic ones that we recommend every horse owner to have ready. Next, we're going to talk specifically about bandaging supplies because often that's something that most horse owners deal with at some point in time is a wound or elaceration. And for the emergency care, our main concern is stopping the bleeding and then keeping that wound clean. So while this list could get extremely extensive, once you're dealing with a specific type of wound in a specific location, having these items on this slide on hand for most of our basic emergency care is recommended. So the first one on there is diapers and we're talking human diapers. They work really, really well for covering wounds. They're very absorbent so they can handle having a lot of blood and wound accident and absorbing that. They work great for hoof injuries as well. So having a many, many diapers on hand is really an affordable, easy way to protect a wound in an emergency. Then you need something to secure that diaper and vet wrap is commonly used. It's stretchy, it sticks to itself. You're able to secure that diaper into a wound area on a leg or a foot. The next one is a product that some people maybe aren't as familiar with. It's called Elasticon and it's similar to vet wrap except it's sticky. So if you had a laceration on an area you could not wrap, say the horse's shoulder or hip or an area that you wouldn't be able to cleanly wrap like the leg and the photo. Elasticon works well because it'll stick to the hair quite nicely. So you're able to cover that wound and prevent more debris from getting in with that item. It is fairly spendier, more spendy than vet wrap so a lot of times people might just have a little bit of Elasticon on hand but it is recommended. Gauze of course is to pack wounds to stop some bleeding, again provide some more material and then a nonstick bandage to put directly over the wound. Cotton roll or a standing wrap is the next important thing and that's to provide extra padding to be able to secure whatever absorbent material you're using to that wound until you can get to the vet or the vet can get to you. Clean it out, flush it out and do a full wrap later on. And then you notice I say and many, many more because when you look at some of the resources we have the links that we've provided with full lists of first day kits you can get again very, very in depth and it's up to you how much you want to put into your kit. If you want to do just the bare bones basics we're recommending here or providing information on here you can get very in depth. Quite a few different options. Next one I'm going to briefly touch on is what to have for medications and really this needs to be a discussion with your veterinarian and the reason for that is because many of these are prescription only. So they're going to need to write you a script or directly get that that product to you and that might depend again on your relationship with your vet and the understanding of what might work best in your situation on your farm and ranch. So some things that might be included in this would be an eye ointment something you can use to deal with an eye injury until the vet can get out and look with it look at it. Their preferred wound care meds you'll find that some veterinarians have certain preferences on what they would like you to use and not use for wound care so check with them and and keep your bets happy right use what they like to use as well. The next one on there is NSAIDs or non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs. So in the horse world these would be things that are commonly referred to the name the drug names as banamine, flemexan, butte and butazone those type of products that can provide some pain relief and anti-inflammatory properties. The key with these again is knowing how to administer them by visiting with your veterinarian what doses they're in and then checking with your veterinarian before ever medicating a horse in an emergency. And that's because certain emergencies the severity of them can be masked if you medicate before your vet is able to provide you that guidance. So we never want to go and just administer these medications without checking with our veterinarian first. The next one on the list is sedation. So there are some oral sedation products out there that can be prescribed to you in the case of emergencies and and you want to visit with your veteran when you would maybe consider administering those. Anaseptic washes people have preferences whether they want some betadine scrubs or solutions or hexadine solution those types of things for wound cleaning and cleansing. And of course, there's many other products that you could put in here too. Some people are a fan of Alu-Mand or Alu-Shield products, silver sulfadiesine, just different ointments and medications you want to have on hand. I'm going to turn it over to Rachel and she's going to talk about vital signs. Hi everybody. So when I talk about vital signs, this might be a situation where you are already in an emergency situation or your horse isn't acting like they normally do and something is up. So you want to check them before before calling your veterinarian and most of them we all know, you know, our TPR, which is our temperature pulse and respiration. We always want to take our temperature rectally because that is the best way to do it on an animal. But we also have mucus membranes, capillary refill time, which is a CRT, and then we're going to check hydration status as well to see if they are dehydrated. So as we get into them, I'm going to talk about how we take them and what we recommend using for those things. So I have a picture here. We obviously all know what a digital thermometer looks like. Like Paige had said, we want to make sure that those batteries are good so that might be something that's in the kit that would come in the house or into a temperature controlled area so that battery doesn't go bad on you. Check it regularly to make sure it's something that's always working. The other one I have here is actually not recommended anymore. It's an old mercury thermometer. But it is something kind of a blast from the past there. But we do recommend now the digital thermometers. And like I said before, a rectal temperature is the best temperature to get because that's going to be the most accurate on a horse and the easiest to get depending upon the situation. So when we're taking a pulse, pulse is the second letter in that TPR. So we want to know how the heart rate is. So we can either do it by palpation and there's a couple of ways that we can get into the palpation. So what I'm looking at here is a digital palpation. So we can check on the backside of the pastor and on both sides. There is a way to check the digital pulse. We can check on the body behind the elbow as well, but we would be listening with a stethoscope. So if you have a stethoscope in your first aid kit, that's another option. If you can't reach a foot or it's not safe to reach a foot, there's another option. And that is a facial artery that's just underneath that chin or cheekbone. And that's another good way to check a pulse on a horse. There's a third option, but a lot of times we're not able to get to this one. And that is the brachiocephalic on the back leg in between or behind the gaskin is another artery that you can palpate to check the pulse. It's a larger artery, but a little bit harder to get to in an emergency situation unless that horse is standing and being cooperative for you. So like I said, the stethoscope is another option where you can listen to the heart just behind the left, on the left side, just behind the elbow. Other tools that you'll need, which Paige had mentioned are in the kit, a watch with a second hand. You can use a smartphone or a stopwatch and something to write down on so that you know what the pulse is, what the temperature was. Because by the time you take all that information in, you forget some of it. And it's the best to do before you call the vet so that they have a better understanding of what's going on. So anytime that you take a pulse or a respiration and we're going to talk about this too, you're going to count the beats or the respiration for 15 seconds and then multiply by four. And that'll give you what happens in a total minute. You want to do this because that's the general term. They want to know how many beats per minute or how many respirations per minute or breaths per minute. These are all important to know. So if you know your multiples by four, you're doing great. Another vital sign, like I said, to take for respiration, we can either do it visually, watch the rise and fall of the flank or that chest, the rib cage. The other is to feel. You can put your hand immediately in front of the nostril of the horse if he allows you to do it. And then every time you feel a breath, you count it again for that 15 seconds and then multiply it by four. Or you can listen with a stethoscope. The lungs are huge on a horse. So you can listen in several different areas, usually two to three on each side. And anytime you use a stethoscope, I want you to practice it before you get into a situation like this. A lot of the times if you're working with a veterinarian and you're at a regular appointment, ask them to help you with the stethoscope so that you can get an accurate, accurate way to listen to the heart and where to listen to the lungs at so that you can become a better horse owner overall. Again, you'll need that watch or smartphone so that you can count that 15 seconds and then multiply by four. Another vital sign to look for, helps with colic, helps with some other digestive issues as well, is the mucus membranes. As you can see, I've flipped the lip here and they are pink and moist, which we want to see. But you can also check an eyelid. You can check the vulva of a mare or the rectum of a gelding. A lot of the times that mucus membrane will be there too and you can check to see if it is pink and moist as well. So you want to check that because any time circulation is poor in a horse, their mucus membranes are going to be either white or sometimes blue. And that's not going to be good. So you want to make sure that you know that. Another one is capillary refill time. So when you have that lip flipped for mucus membranes, you're going to take your finger and just press into it and let go. And the time that it takes for the mucus membrane to go white and then come back to pink again is the time that we're looking at for our mucus membrane or our capillary refill time. Usually we want to see less than a second. But if it's longer than a second, go ahead and time that and write it down as well. This is important for circulation problems. The next one, we're going to talk about dehydration status or hydration status. And we do that with a skin pinch test. So what we do, it's also called skin tenting. So if you heard it that way, you just grab a portion of the skin in a loose area. And usually I choose on the neck because it's not too taut on the neck. And you just pull out and let go. If that skin snaps back, your hydration status on your horse is good. They have been drinking regularly. They're not dehydrated at all. If you've been working your horse, you might see a little bit different. It might go back a little slower, which is fine because if they've been working, obviously they're going to need some water. As it goes back slowly, you're going to want to time it as well. If the skin stays tented, that means that your horse is dehydrated. Sometimes your hydration status, once you know that the skin is tented and you talk to your vet about that, if you're going into the vet or if they come out, sometimes they'll bring fluids along to help with this. So knowing that prior to them coming out is going to help them stock their truck. So that's important too. So our normal or ideal vital signs are all listed here. And every good horse owner knows those. If you don't, this is the time to get familiar with them because it's really easy. One of the things that I'm going to recommend besides taking all of this at rest, taking it after working out, getting to know your horse's habits and all of their vital signs at rest and while working is super important because you know their range then. If they're super stressed out, their range is going to be completely different from when they're comfortable working or even at rest. So knowing those two differences is a good, good thing. The next thing we're going to move to is kind of assessing that situation because not only do we want to keep our horses safe, but we also want to keep ourselves safe because anybody who gets injured while helping a horse is not going to be useful to them, getting them to the vet or getting them the help that they need in the long run. So assessing the situation, taking a little bit of time before you run up to that horse before is going to help you in spades to make sure that you are safe and they are safe because sometimes if we overreact, they're going to overreact too. Horses are really good at masking symptoms because they are prey and this is something that's pretty common for horses. So we want to know what we're looking for. Most of the time owners know what's going on because something's a little off. Well, that's time to take your TPR and see if you need to call a vet, but look at the horse as a whole. When you're assessing them, how do they look? Are they relaxed or are they showing signs of pain? And this is just a short list. There's a lot of things that can go on. If they're heads down, if they're in an uncomfortable position or hunch their back, outright discomfort can be characterized as sweating, pacing, kicking or unusual tail switching. And we also chatted last night. Not sweating is also a sign of something going wrong. So if you're in an extreme heat situation and all of the other horses in the pen are sweating, but yours isn't, there's a problem there too. So I bring up this picture because I want you guys to look at a lot of the things that are going on here. Look at the ears, the eyes and the facial muscles, nostrils and muzzle. Colorado State has a really nice infographic on how things look in a pain scale on a horse. Are they standing or in a recumbent position, which means they might be laying down or on their side? And then is it safe for me to get in there? Because when they're in pain, they're also fearful. And if I rush in there, they might panic and either hit me or run over to get out of my way. So those are all important things to look at. I bring up this picture a little bit closer because the filly in the front, you can definitely see she is uncomfortable. She is not happy about this situation. She's leaning away from the person taking the picture. Her ears are back, she's watching you, but there's a lot of concern around those muscles of the eye. If you can see her facial muscles are also very taut. You might not see it in her nose. Sometimes they wrinkle their nose, but we also have some wrinkles kind of down by the corner of the mouth. These are all signs of stress or facial expressions of stress or pain or worry. So these are all things to watch because it's important as you're assessing a situation on if it's safe for you to enter. Here's that chart I was talking about from the University of Colorado or Colorado State University. It talks about different facial expressions as it goes for pain. As you can see from zero, obviously there is no pain on this horse all the way to four. And I know I've seen a couple in that three to four range where you can definitely tell they are in, they are super uncomfortable and in pain. And the last thing I wanted to bring up here is when to call a veterinarian. So we know that there's something going on or we want to make sure that our horse is doing okay. So you're unsure about something. Let's talk about what you might call them for in the first place. So our non-emergency stuff, the one that establishes that BCPR is our vaccines. If they've had chronic lameness and you just want to keep them up, maintenance is a thing in horses. You always want to make sure they're maintained well. Chronic loose stools is another thing. Health certificate, Coggins, chiropractor, acupuncture, or joint injections are all things that you want to maintain a BCPR for. If you do have an emergency, a lot of these emergencies are the ones that you might not be super urgent, but you still want to see the vet. So last durations that are not over a joint, allergic reactions, but they're still breathing okay. New Marin full that are acting normal. And if you have a Marin full, you're likely going to be seeing them from the time that she is inseminated all the way up till that birth. Eye pain, acute diarrhea, not eating, not drinking, new lameness, and then swollen legs. Anything that would be urgent would be uncontrolled bleeding, elaceration over a joint, allergic reactions with breathing compromise. If your Marin full are not meeting the benchmarks after birth, difficulty breathing, labor of that mare if she hasn't pushed that full out within 30 minutes. But again, that's something that you'll be calling your regular veterinarian on to let him know that she's falling so that you have that opening already. Down and unable to rise, fever, colic, choke, severe lameness, a grain overload, and a prolonged erection in a stallion. So for summary, I'll pitch it back to page here. All right, so we're kind of wrapping up today. If you have some questions, please feel free to put those into the Q&A box or the chat and we'll get those answered here in just a moment. But we just want to visit again a little bit about the idea that emergencies happen. So hopefully today you had a few reminders or learn something new that, okay, yep, I'm going to go home. I'm going to check my first aid kit. I'm going to practice taking vital signs. I'm going to make sure that I have that relationship with my veterinarian or maybe two or three veterinarians. Maybe I need to make sure that I know and those veterinarians know me and my horses. Because again, we know there's a shortage. There's only so many available in the area. And in an emergency, you might need to have that backup referral. Visit with your primary vet to say, okay, if you're not available because you're doing whatever other things are happening at that moment. And it's a true emergency. Where else do I go? Know the referral hospitals in your area. Sometimes you have to load your horse and start driving and then be making those phone calls and seeing where you can go, where you can get checked out. Let them know you're on your way and the instances. Build that first aid kit to whatever level that you feel comfortable with after, you know, watching this webinar today. But for sure, have those basic items on hand. They're really going to save you an emergency. Learn to take those vital signs. Familiarize yourself with some of the common emergencies that were provided on that AAP list in the previous slide. We don't have time to talk about all of those individual things today. But visit with your veterinarians. And when I visit with veterinarians in North Dakota, they talk about things that are very common for emergencies such as colic, wound care management, foiling emergencies, high fevers, eye injuries or emergencies, and many, many more. You know, there's too many to list, but those definitely come to mind as the most common issues. So with that, I'm going to turn it back to Mary. Okay, thank you. I am over here taking notes like crazy thinking I need to practice some learning how to take vital signs. This will be great for the spring. When we're out brushing winter hair off, I can learn how to take vital signs as well. So, okay, challenge accepted. So, let's see, we did have just a couple questions and some were just comments. And so I'm going to throw up the poll for everybody to take for now and let's go through these. So Joanna offered for size options while diapers are a really good option. Sometimes Maxi or mini pads work really well also. There's different size options there. And so again, absorbent, but different size options depending on the type of wound that you have. Let's see. So Andrea offered, if you can't remember, and I'm thinking this was vital signs, if you can't remember your vital signs, tape that to the note card. So write it on a note card and then tape that on the inside lid of your emergency kit. Then you have it. You have what normal is on you all the time. So when I said challenge accepted page challenges, go home and practice this stuff. Go home and practice. And so I'm sitting here listening and I'm thinking, I write an emergency situation is not the time to learn how to do the things. And so that is perfect. And I know what I'll be doing this spring. Let's see. And so Paige did also offer up so the American Association of equine practitioners does have a list of resources for horse owners. And so they have a list of equine member vets that you can access so you can start working on that veterinary client patient relationship. And so we'll put that link in the email that we send out with the recording. Let's see. So somebody offered up make sure your horse will allow you or the vet to touch certain parts of their body like their teeth, their lips, their ears. And so we want to make sure that we can access all parts of that in the event that one part of the that animal is injured. Let's see. I'm going to offer this up to is that a picture can be worth a thousand words. So sometimes as horse owners, we say, well, I don't think my vet needs to see that. I think it'll be okay. So sometimes we have horse owners on that spectrum. And and sometimes it's not, you know, maybe it just looks like a little cut or a puncture wound, but it's right over a joint or it's in a sensitive area where that really needs to be an emergency that scene very quickly. And then on the other end of the spectrum, sometimes it's a it's a really minor thing and maybe the owner is making it a little bit more severe than than it needs to be. So pictures and videos can really help your vet determine how bad it is and they can help advise you if you need to get going to a referral clinic right away or if they can wait until they can fit you in their schedule. Okay, very good. The other thing that Mary mentioned was you want to touch your be able to touch your horse everywhere. That's part of your grooming routine. So make sure when you groom your horse, you can do all of those things so that it's it's something you do every day when it becomes something you do every day. It is not a scary thing. Very good. So Katrina Katrina is looking for somebody who might be a great vet in the Fargo Moorhead area and Katrina. I'm thinking that that list that page offered might be of help to you. And so that and then also I see a couple of people have offered some things up here. I would say that we don't necessarily recommend one vet over another, especially today. So we just really want you to have a great relationship with somebody who's local to you. And so we can I want you to reach out to who you feel comfortable with but also there's some some folks offering some suggestions in here for that. Let's see here. So there is oh yeah picking up their feet Andrea says very important. So somebody had requested that we zoom in on a picture. I'm sorry I had to step away for a minute and so just know that you are going to get the presentation with the recording. And so you can zoom in if there was something that you really wanted to see. Let's see. So Valerie and I think Rachel this one's probably for you. Can you describe the process placement and sounds when listening for gut sounds with a stethoscope. So it's really important to familiarize yourself with that tool before you get started doing some of these things because there are some nuances with it so that you can find and figure out what's going on. And that's why I mentioned if you do have a stethoscope work with your local veterinarian to get them to help you with some of the placement. As for gut sounds you're going to move kind of behind where the lungs would be so behind the rib cage high and low on on that abdomen to check for gut sounds and you're going to do it on both sides not just one. But as you're practicing you're going to find the most mobile area of your horse with the practice that you do on checking those vital signs checking for gut sounds and do it more than just once a month. I mean like I said you want to check them at rest and you want to check them after you've been working them so that you know they had mentioned putting the vital signs on the top lid of your emergency kit. Well right next to the regular vital signs you can write your horses normal as well because not everybody fits within that little box right. Hey very good. So Paige and or Rachel do you guys have just a very general emergency that you example that you could give. And so somebody had asked you like is there some kind of situation that you have actually had and then you've responded to that. So can you share just one high level story of an instance where you've used the things that you just shared today. Yeah so I could answer that in general a little bit so it's highly situational right. So that's why we we can't really get totally into detailed situations but let's say something that people are maybe comfortable or not comfortable common like a horse collicking. Okay so that can be one of many many many different reasons and causes and a different process on how that horse is going to be treated depending upon the signs and symptoms. So that's where you know if you have a horse that is collicking you want to be monitoring that horse taking those vital signs getting in touch with your veterinarian and providing those vital signs to them will help them determine a course of treatment and decide you know how quickly you need to get that horse to a referral hospital or if they're able to come and treat that horse on your place. Some of the common things that are just recommended in all of those cases is to keep the horse quiet and calm so that might be different for different types of horses. So a lot of times we think well let's bring them in the barn. If it's a horse that lives outside 24-7 it never comes in the barn that might not be the best place for them. The more important thing is to keep them quiet and calm or maybe you can bring them inside with another horse as a friend or a buddy. Removing feet and water is always recommended and keeping yourself safe so you'll hear all sorts of you know should I walk the horse should I not walk the horse. At the end of the day it's keeping your horse safe and yourself safe so if the horse is standing quietly just allowing it to remain quiet and calm is key. So that's just one example of how very situational every single emergency is and that's why it's important to walk through those steps and contact your vet so they can give you that best next recommendation. Agreed it's also important to have the people that you have on your contact list like Paige had mentioned available and ready to help you. Sometimes those people are there to calm you down a little bit too because I know if something happened with me sometimes my energy gets way too high and that will stress out the animal more. So making sure that someone is there to help if you can, but also to to make sure that the situation is going smoothly as smoothly as a emergency situation can go. Okay, so I'm not seeing anything else coming into the chat right now. Paige did put a couple links in there and just know that I will add those to the recording. I will add those to the email when I send the recording out. If there are no other questions, we will be done for today. So please know that we again will be back on May 1 at noon Central time and we'll be talking about genetic disease overview and quarter horses with Dr. Carrie Hammer. And again you'll get a reminder about that as we get a little closer so until then happy spring. And I think the temps are going to come up at least in North Dakota in the northern part here and so we're very excited about that so I'm sure you'll all be out busy doing horse stuff. So we'll see you again in about a month.