Miracle Mini!

My name is Martha Gladden and I am from Tracy, California, sixty miles east of San Francisco. I have a beautiful five-year-old miniature palomino mare, barely thirty inches high and one hundred fifty pounds. Last April Dusta got caught under a fence and severely dislocated her hip. We took her to Pioneer Equine Hospital in Oakdale, California, a clinic known for orthopedic work on horses. After a grueling five hours in surgery and traction with a come-along, the hip would not stay in place. The surgeons had nothing to pin or screw to that wouldn't just pop loose. Dr. Mac Donald, formerly of Mid-Rivers Equine Hospital in Mid-Rivers, Missouri, decided to attempt a femur ostectomy. To we laymen a femur ostectomy is a dog surgery that could only help Dusta because she is dog-sized. The surgeon completely removes the head of the femur and the joint is allowed to heal up without a ball and socket, supported totally by scar tissue. This was the first time this procedure was performed on an equine patient!

After two surgeries we brought Dusta home, but because she wasnt using the leg we had to send her back for physio-therapy and medication to help bring the drawn-up leg closer to the ground. The injured leg was now two inches shorter due to bone loss. We were fighting against time and a three-legged horse to get weight off the good leg before it broke down. We knew Dusta would not make it if her good leg gave out.

In the next week poor Dusta began a therapeutic regimen at a thoroughbred rehab ranch nearby, swimming two laps three times a day six days a week for three weeks. The doctors added weights on the leg, lots of extra physio-therapy and range in motion exercises. The leg and hoof came closer to the ground but she was still twisted over to the good leg and her back had started to develop a curve. She wanted to touch the ground with that hoof so badly but the injured leg was shorter than the other and still painful. I think she just became afraid to use it.

I was desperate to save her and the good leg and to help her to put pressure on the shortened leg and hoof. I didnt know what to do next. My doctors had given up on her. Lift shoe? Some kind of traction device that lifts her good side up and rolls her back over to the bad side? This mare was so special to us, especially to my five-year old daughter Cody who once said that if she could grow up to be anyone in the world, she wanted to grow up to be Dusta. This broke my heart. Dusta, the cutest thing youve ever seen, long neck and dishy little head, very Araby-looking. She won last years Reserve National Champion at the miniature horse show and we were going to lose her despite all the effort.


I had to make her right. I was told that after this type of surgery, there was no other remedy. We were starting to lose the good leg. I could see it coming! After a desperate Yahoo! search, I found Indian Creek Equine Rehabilitation Center. Suzie Franz sent me a detailed e-mail giving me some some possible veterinary contacts in my area of the world. None of the contacts responded positively. After corresponding further with Suzie I began considering the possibility of sending Dusta all the way to Southern Illinois. What finally prompted me to send her the two-thousand miles from home was the encouragement I got from Dr. MacDonald. He knew Suzie personally and was aware of her work at the Center. He told me that if I was willing to transport Dusta, it was worth a shot! What an irony that the surgeon and the rehab specialist were part of the same little world but now separated by half a continent.

We wanted to fly her out, but the airlines told us the cargo compartment would be way too hot in the middle of August. Within the week I had arranged instead for a transport company to pick up Dusta in Tracy,California, carry her across the desert in a van specially equipped for horses, through Texas, up the Oklahoma turnpike, in and out of the Mark Twain National Forest and the Ozarks and across the Mississippi River. The journey took five days, but in the wee morning hours Dusta arrived at Indian Creek Stables none the worst for wear.

At the Rehab Center, after a thorough exam by Dr. Jon McCormick, DVM, Suzie began ultra-sound, photon laser therapy and gentle range of motion exercises immediately. Dr. Linda Harmon-Dodge, from the Amish town of Arthur, Illinois, performed chiropractic manipulation to help straighten her pelvis and back. To our delight, Dusta began taking tentative little steps, placing weight on the injured leg! In the months following her surgery, she had never been comfortable enough to attempt this. After three weeks Suzie and her assistant created a temporary lift shoe from a Styrofoam bucket and fitted it to her tiny foot (look closely at the picture and you can see how it was taped on). Suzie and I were in contact almost daily. When we received the first videotape of Dusta walking, I cried and Cody kept kissing the TV screen.

We just received word that Dusta bucked and trotted this morning, the brisk fall weather obviously perking her up. Wow! Soon we will be bringing her back home. While we know she will never walk again without a little limp, the thought of her struggle makes her that much more precious to us. Cody and I send our thanks and gratitude to all the excellent surgeons and doctors who dared perform this experimental surgery, a first in equine history. We especially want to thank Suzie Franz and Indian Creek Equine, who offered a ray of hope in a dark cloud of anguish. I am amazed at the lengths people will go to help and at all the prayers Dusta received. She is truly a Miracle Mini!

Sincerely,
Martha Gladden
Tracy, California