Want to join me in making a difference? I'm raising money to benefit horses, and any donation will help
make an impact. We desperately need a diagnostic assay for a horse disorder which destroys leg tendons
and other tissues. My laboratory has been working on this destructive and puzzling disorder affecting
many breeds of horses. It is called degenerative suspensory ligament desmitis or DSLD for short.
You do not have to own horses to love these graceful beautiful creatures. They communicate with their
eyes and gentle movements, and when they suffer, you can tell from their expression. And many of them do
suffer, especially those horses afflicted with DSLD of certain ligaments (and tendons) in their lower
legs.
As you can see on the photo the fetlock drops – in some cases to the ground, and stays like this. That
becomes quite painful, and horses become lame, unable to move around. Because of the unrelenting pain
(and no available treatment), many horses end up being euthanized, much to distress of their owners.
It was our lab in the College of Veterinary Medicine that discovered that this is a systemic disease
affecting mostly tendons and ligaments, but also other organs, such as aorta, sclerae in the eye and
even skin. We have some idea what damages the tissues – accumulation of so called proteoglycans disrupts
normal architecture and weakens tendons and ligaments in the legs as one of the main problems. So far no
genetic defect or mutation has been discovered (though DSLD tends to run in families) and there is no
good diagnostic assay or treatment available. We have found that certain genes are highly expressed in
the skin of horses with DSLD. Our goal is to develop a diagnostic assay which would identify horses with
DSLD or horses who are likely to get DSLD in the future – right now we have no idea to identify such
animals. To develop this assay we will ask horse owners and veterinarians to send us a small piece of
skin from the horse’s neck so we can test these samples for the presence of certain compounds. We will
have to test a lot of healthy and DSLD-affected horses.
Thanks in advance for your contribution to this cause that means so much not only to me, but to many
horse lovers and veterinarians, and in the end to horses – which is the most important thing!!