Dr Nikita Osborne
Jonathan Hope Young Equine Veterinarian Scholarship 2017

TRAVEL REPORT: In April 2018 I travelled to the UK for 6 weeks of intensive equine speciality experience.

The first part of my trip was to complete the practical training and sit the final exams required to complete my diploma of animal physiotherapy – mostly focused on dogs and horses. I was fortunate enough to spend time with some top equine therapists and learn techniques for massage, stretching exercises, therapy modalities and rehabilitation programmes for lameness in performance horses (especially for the 4* event horses leading up to Badminton).

I passed my final theory and practical exams; the final part of the diploma is to complete a research or literature review project. The review will be on common injuries in dressage horses and the best process for rehabilitation back to athletic competition.

I then travelled to Newmarket to spend two weeks at Rossdales Veterinary Surgeons, a world renowned equine veterinary practice and a leader in equine veterinary health care. I spent most of my time with Dr Michael Shepherd. Mike works mostly with race horses and is particularly interested in lameness and diagnostic imaging. We started every morning at 5am watching the horses train up the Newmarket Heath, we would then follow the horses back to the yard and scope any that had coughed or seemed sub-optimal during the morning’s training. I was fortunate enough to be allowed to ride out with them on some mornings and experience the exhilaration of galloping a 3 year-old colt up the Heath, as well as seeing first-hand how a racing yard works behind the scenes.

Most days were spent going to Mike’s trainers’ yards, seeing respiratory cases, lameness work-ups, standing castrations, joint injections, X-rays, scopes, ultrasounds etc. One particular yard will trot up the entire yard (200 horses) in front of the head trainer and Mike every 2 weeks to assess the “herd” for problems. It was great for me to watch that many horses trot away in quick succession and pick up on subtle lamenesses.

I also spent some days at the hospital with the lameness diagnostic team (following through on cases that I had seen with Mike in the field). The work-ups would start with simple nerve blocks and progress right through to high joint blocks – hips, elbows and shoulders. Then possibly MRI or scintigraphy the next day or go straight to ultrasound and X-rays if a specific area was located. It was remarkable how many lamenesses (performance and race horses) were in the right hind limb.

I went with Mike to the Royal Stud, where I helped do wind testing on the 2 year-old horses for the “breeze up” Sales, and spent time at top NZ eventing riders’ yards. It was great seeing the day-to-day ambulatory service as this is what I do mostly in NZ, including different types of antibiotic protocols, different techniques etc. I felt I was able to absorb a lot more information and ask a lot of questions relevant to cases that I would see at home (much more so than when I was a vet student!).

After my time at Rossdales I moved up to Yorkshire to follow Dr James Crabtree who, with Dr Jonathan Pycock, runs UK Equine Reproductive Services. Equine reproduction is a special interest of mine and I have been slowly developing my skills while working as a mixed animal vet, so it was invaluable to be fully submerged in the peak of the equine breeding season for 2 weeks.

We did a lot of work at a top dressage stud where they had their own embryo donor/recipient herd system in place. The one big advantage I noticed was the access to chilled semen from Europe’s top Warmblood stallions. I got to watch and help with the entire process of embryo transfer, as well as the shipping of embryos to other reproduction centres, collection of semen from stallions and lots of mare ultrasound scans! The time spent driving between clients offered the opportunity to discuss the cases and options of how to manage situations when the mare decided not to follow the rule book.

The entire trip was an invaluable experience for me; spending time with specialists one-on-one was incredible. I have come home with a lot more confidence, knowledge and experience, as well as having made life-long contacts and friends. I am very grateful to Dr Jonathan Hope for this scholarship and the NZ Equine Research Foundation for the opportunity, as well as my employer - Bay Of Islands Veterinary Services – for giving me the time to travel and of course Dr Mike Shepherd and James Crabtree for having me.