Mounted search and rescue

["IRVIN LICHTENSTEIN" <ilichten1@verizon.net>]

Pergolide based drugs have been removed from the market because of the
damage to human heart valves caused by the drug in its only legal use,
treating Parkinsons in humans. Off label uses are not approved or evaluated
by the FDA or any other agency, nor is compounding by a pharmacist to make
the drug more usable by a horse.  

This drug will have to be re-licensed as a horse drug prior to any vet
prescribing it for Cushings.  The problem was that the drug was never on the
vet drugs list so when its human application was dropped in March the
manufacturers could not legally sell it in the US.  In May the FDA said it
would possibly not enforce the rules to provide the off label users with a
source of the drug until the veterinary licensure issue is resolved.

This does not mean that the manufacturers will continue to produce the drug
as it could find its way back onto the human market and the give them the
same pain they have now over heart damage.  

Irv Lichtenstein