Calcitriol, Dr. Nogode's Study update

[Debbyly <Debbyly@aol.com>]

Thank you Karen for the information about the article writen by Dr. Larry
Nagode.   I went through old issues of Trail Blazer to find the article.  It
was published in April 1990.  Dr. Nagode also lectured on the same topic at
the AERC convention that year.  The title of the article was "Thumps,
Hypocalcemic Problems of the Endurance Horse, Some New Approaches".  It is an
excellent article and I found it well worth rereading.  Heidi and Susan, you
might enjoy reading it.  I will send you copies if you send me your snail mail
address.

Dr. Nagode was researching a theory he had that supplementing horses about
four days before a 100 mile ride with calcitriol (really) would improve the
efficiency of intestinal calcium transport and also the efficiency of calcium
reabsorption from the urine to the blood by the kidney.  Some experimentation
was done with endurance horses at some major 100 mile rides.

I contacted Dr. Nagode today by phone at Ohio State University.  He was kind
enough to spend some time with me talking about that research and what has
gone on since then.  That article was his last publication on the subject.  He
found that  the expected improvement of intestinal calcium absortion with
supplemental calcitriol did not happen in horses as it does in some other
species.  It was not determined whether the renal effect happens.  He was not
able to get further funding to continue his studies with horses.  He did
receive funding to study calcium and kidney disease in dogs and cats and has
been doing research in that area ever since.

He still believes that too much calcium in the diet interferes with the
adaptive mechanisms for dealing with calcium deficiency.  He also agreed with
me that respiratory alkalosis (subject of post a few months ago) can
contribute to thumps.

Debby Lyon