Global Hunter (Arg), who sustained a life-threatening breakdown in the American Handicap (G2) at Hollywood Park on July 4, is expected to be released from Alamo Pintado Equine Medical Center in Los Olivos, California this week.

The seven-year-old Jade Hunter horse, who broke down moments after winning the race, was thought to have less than a 1% chance of survival.

During a three-hour surgery on July 5 to repair midline fractures of both sesamoids and a dislocated fetlock in his right foreleg, surgeons Carter Judy, D.V.M., and Doug Herthel, D.V.M., used 17 screws, two wires, and a special locking plate to repair the damage, fuse the fetlock, and stabilize the horse’s suspensory apparatus…

Read the full article at Thoroughbred Times.

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Photo courtesy Marci Heacox.

See Alamo Pintado founder Dr. Doug Herthel and other leaders in the development of stem cell therapies present cases and new research.

Stem-cell therapy has been shown to have benefits in a variety of ailments from spinal cord injuries to heart failure. And just this week, Italian researchers released findings from a study on patients left blinded after exposure to chemicals whose sight was restored using corneas grown from their own stem cells.

Such curative value has not gone unnoticed by the veterinary world — and one of the pioneers in the use of adult equine stem cells to treat injured horses is Dr. Doug Herthel, owner and founder in 1972 of Alamo Pintado Equine Medical Center in Los Olivos.

From humble beginnings performing abdominal surgeries in the front yard of his first home-office, not far from what is now the tasting-room capital of the Valley, Dr. Herthel has grown his practice to encompass internal medicine, lameness evaluation, diagnostics, physical rehabilitation, hyperbaric treatment and state-of-the-art stem-cell therapy on a sprawling 40-acre ranch south of town.

Read the full article: Healing equines with stem cells – Santa Barbara News-Press (PDF)