Dueling Vet's on Lasix

[freddymo]

Originally Posted by GenuineRisk

I don't think it's disputed that a horse can run faster when he's not bleeding in his lungs, and study after study has shown that the vast majority of race horses bleed in their lungs at some point in their careers. Is something that, at best, enables horses to run to the limit of their ability (as opposed to below it) a performance enhancer? I mean, it's not like it can make a slow horse fast.

Dr Cohen suggests the following:


“I don’t care what anyone else says, 99% of all horses run on Lasix and 99% of all horses do not bleed,” Cohen said. “Period. End of story. I have been scoping horses for 30 years and the percentage of horses that really bleed is less than 10%. Do not listen to any veterinarian tell you differently.


Strange that there is such diversity in Vet's opinions on a fairly simple condition to substantiate?

[Rudeboyelvis]

Originally Posted by freddymo

Dr Cohen suggests the following:


“I don’t care what anyone else says, 99% of all horses run on Lasix and 99% of all horses do not bleed,” Cohen said. “Period. End of story. I have been scoping horses for 30 years and the percentage of horses that really bleed is less than 10%. Do not listen to any veterinarian tell you differently.


Strange that there is such diversity in Vet's opinions on a fairly simple condition to substantiate?

His math is dubious at best. But besides that, if he has been scoping horses for 30 years....and 99% of the horses he is scoping are on Lasix, and thus 99% of horses don't bleed, what point exactly is he trying to make? That it works?

How could he possibly know that less than 10% of horses actually need it if 99% of his test samples are on it?

[GenuineRisk]

Originally Posted by freddymo

Dr Cohen suggests the following:


“I don’t care what anyone else says, 99% of all horses run on Lasix and 99% of all horses do not bleed,” Cohen said. “Period. End of story. I have been scoping horses for 30 years and the percentage of horses that really bleed is less than 10%. Do not listen to any veterinarian tell you differently.


Strange that there is such diversity in Vet's opinions on a fairly simple condition to substantiate?

As I said earlier, he says, "That really bleed." Now, it's hard to tell exactly what is meant without hearing the tone, but in a lot of situations, "really" means "a lot." Like, "It's really hot out," or "he's really cute," or "that was a really bad op-ed Bill wrote there." If he means "really bleed" as in, bleed to where you can see it with the naked eye because it's coming out the horse's nose, then sure, I'll give him that only ten percent of the horses he's scoped "really bleed."

Rudeboyelvis also pointed out something I missed: that if the horses the vet is scoping are running/training on Lasix, then yes, it would stand to reason that most of them wouldn't bleed. Because that's what Lasix does, makes them not bleed.