Hope continues to spring eternal that Barbaro, against all odds, can win his bout with the dreaded hoof disease laminitis.
Dr. Dean Richardson, chief of surgery at the New Bolton Center in Kennett Square, Pa., reported yesterday morning that the Derby champ, who eight weeks ago to the day fractured his right hind leg in the Preakness, had a “very good [Friday] night” and remains in stable condition.
“His heart rate and pulse are normal, and his appetite is good,” Richardson said. “He continues to respond well, looks good and has a positive attitude. We continue to monitor him very closely, and we are keeping him as comfortable as possible.”
Maintaining that positive attitude is the key to Barbaro’s survival.
“If he’s not comfortable, horses tell you,” Richardson said Thursday, when he revealed Barbaro had contracted laminitis – a painful swelling inside the hoof – in his “good” left hind leg. “You look in their eye. You look for whether or not they’re eating. You see if he wants to spend more time down [resting in a sling used to support his weight], whether or not he’s sagging.”
Ever since Richardson operated on Barbaro to stabilize his broken leg the day after the Preakness, the biggest fear was that he would develop laminitis – the same ailment that killed Secretariat – in his other hind leg, by putting too much weight on it.
Unfortunately, that’s what happened after Barbaro developed an infection in his right hind last weekend that required an extensive new operation to replace the metal plate and screws holding the fracture together. By favoring that leg and placing too much pressure on the other limb, he cut off the circulation to the laminae – the tissue that holds the hoof to the coffin (foot) bone – causing the tissue to become inflamed, then break down, separating the hoof from the bone.
It is, Richardson said, an “exquisitely painful” condition. Wednesday, he operated on the foot, cutting away 75 percent of the hoof that was no longer attached to the bone and placing the foot in a soft cast. Since then, Barbaro has been on an intensive pain-management regimen. If he can no longer stand on the diseased foot, or if he develops laminitis in any of his other feet, that would be the end.
“It’s strictly comfort,” Richardson said. “We have to look at the foot on a regular basis. This is a very slow progress. If we were to get through the other end of this, it’d be crazy to think it would be anything less then five or six months. That would be a rapid recovery for this problem.”
