Groundbreaking surgery conducted on pony whose face was disfigured due to acid attack
A pony that was found terribly wounded from a suspected acid attack in Chesterfield, Derbyshire was treated with a ground-breaking operation by grafting fish skin on the wound.
The 8-month-old pony, Cinders, was taken to the Rainbow Equine Hospital in North Yorkshire after it was found with its face horribly disfigured.
Nearly £14,000 were raised in donations for its treatment with a skin graft surgery to heal the burnt parts.
A US vet traveled all the way from California to Britain in order to perform the surgery after the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals had attended to the foal on April 25.
Jamie Peyton, the US vet from University of California in Davis, had developed a technique of grafting fish skin on animals who burn their skin during wild forest fires.
The operation took place on Tuesday, to aid the growth of fresh skin and tissue on Cinder’s face, skin of a tilapia fish was grafted on to it, the Daily Mail reported.
The team of vets worked on her wounds before dressing the fish skin on Cinder’s face. Vet David Rendle worked with Peyton, and Ryckie Wade, a plastic surgeon at the burns unit at Pinderfields Hospital in Wakefield, West Yorkshire.
According to Rendle from the equine hospital, fish skin is use because it is a good source of collagen and retains moisture well.
He said, “Animals that have been treated with fish skin dressings before seem to be far more comfortable after these dressings have been applied.”
Since these dressings are very painful, Rendle said they want to change Cinders' dressings as infrequently as possible to spare her the pain.
“Extraordinary injuries called for extraordinary treatments.”
Due to her burns from her tip of the nose to the eye, Cinders needs to receive constant care and support.
The original target for the funds was £3000 but on the Justgiving page for Cinders, a whopping £14000 was raised as the treatment continued.
Rendle is confident that the pony won't be left with any long term ill effects. He later said, “'She has a long road ahead but she seems untroubled by her ordeal.”
Rendle added, "We are confident it was a chemical attack - acid would seem the most likely based on other recent reports. We believe the horse was deliberately dumped after its injuries had been inflicted.It was dumped at a private yard so we assume whoever dumped it was hoping it would be found and receive treatment.
But for whatever reason, they weren't prepared to organize this treatment themselves.
She was very weak, stressed, thin and dirty when she arrived at the hospital but had coped extremely well here.”
The pony is recovering very fast. The hospital has set up the Justgiving page for further support for the treatment.