Dr. Ted Vlahos treats everything from cancer to fractures, neonates and toothaches. He takes x-rays, performs arthroscopic surgery and designs prosthetics to replace limbs that have been amputated. Every so often he even does embryo transfers. Dr. Vlahos is a modern-day country doctor through and through … especially since his patients usually have four legs rather than two. Since 1997, Dr. Vlahos and his team have given animals – mostly horses – access to pretty much the same type and level of medical care available to humans. 

While horses used to be shot if they broke their leg, Dr. Vlahos has proven that doesn’t have to be the case. Take Lakota, who had a problem in the lower part of his front leg that was bullet-worthy if anything was. But Dr. Vlahos went with A(mputation) before B(ullet). Lakota was very much alive, not to mention up and walking around, on a new custom prosthetic leg, only a few hours after Dr. Vlahos amputated his lower leg. Dr. Vlahos is one of the few animal surgeons who does prosthetics and the Sheridan Equine Center is a pioneer in the field. In less extreme cases, Dr. Vlahos can also fix broken bones with plain pins and screws. Even these are revolutionary when applied to horses though.

Wyoming Chronicle will be interviewing Dr. Vlahos in late March and the episode is scheduled to run mid-April. Not that I’m lacking in questions to ask him, but I’d love to hear what you’d ask Dr. Vlahos if you had the chance. I can tell you now though that the answer to whether he can bring one of his patients into the taping is, “no.” It’s already difficult enough for us to find suitable places to tape when we’re on the road. If we needed one that was horse friendly, I fear we’d be out in a field. And that’s just not a good idea in Wyoming in March. Sorry.

– Dina