The Belmont Stakes : Vets Work Hard to Make Operations Simple

The operation that cleared up Tank’s Prospect’s throat, and helped him go on to victories in the Arkansas Derby and the Preakness Stakes, took only 15 or 20 minutes and the 3-year-old colt didn’t even have to leave his stall at Santa Anita.

But more went into readying Tank’s Prospect for those important races than veterinarian Greg Ferraro simply freeing the horse’s entrapped epiglottis, the thin piece of cartilage that folds back over the windpipe during swallowing and prevents food from entering the lungs.

“The success we had with that operation was actually the result of four or five years of work,” Ferraro said the other day from Hollywood Park. “It was awfully nice to have something work out that you’ve spent so much time on.”

Ferraro said he has performed about 24 operations similar to the one done on Tank’s Prospect, who will try to win the last of the Triple Crown races Saturday when he runs in the Belmont Stakes.

By contrast, the operation performed last November on Kentucky Derby winner Spend a Buck is common. Wayne McIlwraith, the Colorado State veterinarian who arthroscopically removed the bone chip from the colt’s right knee, estimated that he has done about 1,200 similar procedures on thoroughbreds and quarter horses in the last four years.

McIlwraith has flown about 200,000 miles to operate on horses in the last two years and this weekend will be at Los Alamitos to perform five operations on quarter horses.

McIlwraith, 37, a New Zealander who has worked in the United States since 1975, was flown to Florida by Spend a Buck’s owners, Dennis and Linda Diaz. He did the 12-minute operation at a clinic at Gulfstream Park. Spend a Buck, who isn’t running in the Belmont, was standing an hour after the surgery. Less than four months later, he ran third in a race at Aqueduct, and his four subsequent post-operative starts have been winning ones, including his $2.6 million win in the Jersey Derby at Garden State Park May 27, which boosted his earnings to a record $3.3 million.

But for the diligence of Ferraro, McIlwraith and some of their colleagues, neither Tank’s Prospect nor Spend a Buck would had the chance to win classic races. The epiglottis operation that worked for Tank’s Prospect had been suggested by Steven Buttgenbach at a veterinarians’ forum seven or eight years ago in Chicago.

“Most of the vets there pooh-poohed the idea,” said the 39-year-old Ferraro, who studied at California Davis. “They didn’t think it was possible.”

As for arthroscopy--which enables a surgeon to see inside a joint while he’s treating it--it had been applied to humans long before it was used on horses in the late 1970s.

“When Spend a Buck won the Kentucky Derby, it gave me the greatest satisfaction I’ve ever known,” McIlwraith said. “It proved to others what many of us had already known--that 80% of the horses having arthroscopic surgery will be better or just as good as they were before. Early on, though, there were reasons for skeptics. There were some screwups, and some people were trying to do these operations who had no business doing them.”

Although Ferraro and McIlwraith won’t say what they charged to treat Tank’s Prospect and Spend a Buck--”It’s tacky to talk money,” McIlwraith said--Gene Klein, who owns Tank’s Prospect, and the Diazes got bargains.

Ferraro said that he operated for “practically nothing” on Tank’s Prospect, whose wins in the Arkansas Derby and the Preakness were worth $781,850. Fees vary for arthroscopic surgery, but the range is between $700 and $2,000.

Ferraro figured that he owed Klein and trainer Wayne Lukas a favor after they had given the veterinarian a gold, diamond-studded watch for his participation in an operation last fall that saved Saratoga Six for breeding purposes. Saratoga Six, an undefeated 2-year-old, broke down during a workout at Santa Anita, suffering broken ankle bones in his left foreleg.

“What a watch,” Ferraro said. “I told Wayne when he gave it to me that he should also give me a gun so I’ll be able to wear it in public.”

Tank’s Prospect had won his only two starts as a 3-year-old before he finished last among nine horses in the Santa Anita Derby April 6. The next day, Lukas asked Ferraro to examine the colt and that revealed that a membrane was blocking the epiglottis.

“Maybe I’ve had other horses with entrapped epiglottises but I’ve never known I did,” Lukas said.

Ferraro offered two options--a larynx operation that would have sidelined Tank’s Prospect for the rest of the 3-year-old season, or a procedure using a device that Ted Fenton, a Burbank instrument maker, had developed.

“It’s a stainless steel rod about 20 inches long,” Ferraro said. “It has a hook-shaped blade that cuts backward and has a dull side that can be passed up the horse’s nostril without causing any damage.

“It doesn’t even have a name,” Ferraro said. “After what Tank’s Prospect did, maybe we should call it the Preakness hook.”

Ferraro said Lukas had nothing to lose. If the simpler operation didn’t work, the larynx could be worked on.

Don Wheat, a professor of surgery with whom Ferraro studied at Davis, had espoused Buttgenbach’s theories and in recent years had experimented with epiglottis techniques.

“We were accused of chasing a red herring,” Ferraro said. “Now I’m getting calls from vets around the country, asking about what we did.”

If Tank’s Prospect wins the Belmont, maybe Lukas will give Ferraro another watch. Or a revolver to go with the timepiece he already has.