When I lived and worked in the Bucksport area, my best friend was the local veterinarian. Sometimes we talked about the difference between animal and human medicine. Animals can’t tell us how they feel, it’s up to us to read them and to know them.
I just had a situation with a horse that I am boarding, Emma‘s best friend. He stopped eating. Was it an early colic? Was it a tooth problem? Was it something orthopedic? Is it something passing or the beginning of a medical disaster?
Step number one, a dose of Banamine paste. This is a strong anti-inflammatory like a shot of Toradol for a human. Slight improvement, nothing dramatic. Phone call to the horse veterinarian: More anti-inflammatory drug, phenylbutazone, like a super ibuprofen. Maybe a little better, nibbled some hay. My thought as a physician playing vet: Maybe this is a primary G.I. problem? I have some leftover omeprazole in horse doses. I take 20 mg twice a day of the isomer esomeprazole, Nexium. The dose for a horse, that’s why they call it a horse dose, is 100 times as much. If nothing else you could protect him from G.I. side effect of his anti-inflammatory medicine.
Less than 24 hours later my guy is eating up a storm, fed him two suppers tonight.
Doctor playing vet.
A Country Doctor Writes: 
Good job, Doc. I hope he won’t need omeprazole for life!