Please Explain Barbaro's surgeryy and recovery.?

Question

I'm doing a illustrated speech on Barbaro's injury. Could some one please help me understand (in details) what steps of recovery Barbaro went through and how he is now?? I also want to know how long the surgery took for his 27 screws and the 15 inch plate took? Different magazines and websites say different amounts of hours. Anyways, any information about Barbaro and his injury (how he broke it, about the pool of water, the bones he broke) would be awesomeeee. THANKS!

Thank you soo much for the links and the updates!! I was wondering if anyone thinks Barbaro's injury is the fault of Brother Derek. There is some controversey over that subject, even though its not gonna change anything..

Answer 1

There are many Xrays of the leg available online. He is recovering but is not yet *recovered*.
The surgery was reported different times - depending on whether recovery (waking up) was included. The only way for SURE to know is call the center but they are overwhelmed with fans. Most reports are the surgery was about 7 hours.

How he broke it no one knows - he took a bad step it appeared. He immediately started running on three legs and pulled up, which probably saved his life.
the long pastern was in 20 pieces

With using the raft in a pool it enabled him to come out of the anesthetic without injuring the leg. Horses can react unpredictably in the "in between" state - they can thrash around and do more damage than the initial injury. This is what happened to Ruffian - she survived the surgery fine. It was coming out of the drugs from surgery that she began thrashing around and hopelessly shattered the leg.

Barbaro also has his own website now too. The links below have some information - the xanga one follow back to May.

Added info:
Lou Raffetto, the president and chief executive officer of the Maryland Jockey Club, which runs Pimlico, on Tuesday said a review of stewards' patrol films and corresponding still photos has led him to theorize that inadvertent contact between Brother Derek's right front leg and Barbaro's right rear leg contributed to Barbaro taking an awkward step and suffering the fracture.
source http://www.ntra.com/content.aspx?type=news&id=18112

As of June 15 ""The incision has healed well and judging by the radiographs, the graft is opacifying ('taking')," Richardson said. "Callus is forming nicely, and all of the implants (plate and screws) look unchanged."
source http://www.bloodhorse.com/articleindex/article.asp?id=34002

I don't think Brother Derek was at *fault* - he was running straight from what I saw. Accidents happen. Horses are incredibly tough and amazingly fragile at the same time. It would have been much more horrific he had broken down - it was a front leg (more weight bearing, less repairable). If both horses had gone down there'd be no one to pull them up and both could have been lost. Freak accident. :-(