Saved first from the slaughterhouse, then from a devastating leg injury that veterinarians said called for euthanasia, the small bay mare is now one of a handful of horses in the world to sport a customized prosthetic limb after her bad hind leg was amputated below the hock.
Ron Handkamer, a partner with Colman and the former chief prosthetist at the Calgary General Hospital, said he had been asked about prosthetics for sheep and even created one for a flamingo at the city's zoo, but never for a horse.
Mr. Handkamer and his team applied the techniques used to fit people and modified the limb to bring the horse's centre of gravity to the proper position.
They created a heavy-duty, weight-bearing stainless steel prosthesis (titanium is generally used for human prosthetics), but applied the same epoxy resin to laminate the socket in order to absorb pressure. A hockey puck, which had the required density, was used at the bottom of the fake hoof.
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