Parturition Augmentation in Mares - Efficacy and Safety

Foaling complications require prompt intervention to maximize foal viability. The majority of spontaneous foaling occurs late at night when personnel and support services are not readily available, making prompt identification of obstetrical problems difficult. Augmentation of parturition is the advancement of progression from stage I labor to stage II and is safely used in human obstetrics. We hypothesized that parturition augmentation can be used to safely and efficaciously advance foaling to ensure presence of personnel and support services. Our objectives were: 1) to determine the efficacy of augmentation; 2) determine the expected range of time between augmentation and foaling; and 3) to determine if there were side effects to mare or foal from the augmentation. [...]