CHRB cracks down on administering thyroid medication

The California Horse Racing Board on Thursday approved rules that will prohibit the use of medications treating hypothyroidism in horses unless the condition is diagnosed through a specific test.

The board approved the rule unanimously following the recommendation of its medication, safety, and welfare committee. Prior to the consideration of the rule by the committee, the CHRB staff prepared a report saying that several trainers in California continued to abuse the drug, seven years after CHRB officials investigating a rash of sudden deaths in the state established that all of the stricken horses were being administered drugs treating hypothyroidism.

The rule will require a horse to diagnosed through a “thyrotropin-release hormone response test.” CHRB officials said that the only accurate way to diagnose the condition is through the so-called TRH test.

After the investigation of the sudden deaths, the CHRB issued an advisory in 2013 requiring a diagnosis of hypothyroidism in order for a horse to be treated with the drug, but Dr. Arthur suggested that some veterinarians were merely issuing the prescriptions without truly diagnosing the condition. He said that since the beginning of January, there have been 256 prescriptions written for drugs treating hypothyroidism in Thoroughbred horses, with half of those for horses in the barns of two trainers, and with 80 percent of the prescriptions written by three veterinarians.

“This addresses an issue that has frustrated me for almost the entire time I have been a racing practitioner,” Dr. Arthur said.

Dr. Arthur said that hypothyroidism is “rare in horses, and especially rare in young horses, to the point where it’s virtually non-existent.” He suggested that the new rule requiring a specific test result will likely lead to a complete eradication of the use of the drugs on racing backstretches.

* Also at the lengthy meeting, the board approved a schedule for the Northern California fairs in 2021 despite hesitations about planning for the future amidst the disruption created by the coronavirus pandemic. However, Wendy Mitchell, a commissioner, said that it was best to award the dates now so that the fairs can begin planning for their live racing meetings, with adjustments to the schedule made later down the road, if necessary.

“We’ll put a plan in place so people can make plans as if it will be normal, and we will adjust accordingly,” Mitchell said.

Under the schedule, Pleasanton will run from June 16-July 17; the Cal Expo Fair at Sacramento will run from July 17-Aug. 3; the Sonoma County Fair from Aug. 4-Aug. 17; the Ferndale Fair from Aug. 18-Aug. 31; and the Fresno County Fair from Oct. 6-Oct. 19. The Ferndale meet will overlap for one week with Golden Gate, running from Aug. 25 to Oct. 5. Golden Gate will also run from Oct. 20-Dec. 21.

* The board approved a set of rules that will add California to the list of states using the Multiple Medication Violation system, which will allow the CHRB to add penalties to violations if trainers have more than one positive in a year, in any racing jurisdiction. The penalty system has already been adopted in a large number of states.

Dr. Arthur encouraged the board to adopt the system, saying that racing commissions in other states believe that it acts as a deterrent and encourages trainers to deal seriously with overages for therapeutic medications.

* The commission tabled a proposal to approve racing dates for Los Alamitos for a period that begins on Dec. 23, 2020, and runs through Dec. 21, 2021, due to several outstanding issues related to the track’s efforts to reduce the number of fatalities at the track. While fatalities have dropped considerably since this summer, CHRB officials said, the track still needs to reach a formal agreement with horsemen to require a 30-day stand-down from racing for any horse that received an intra-articular injection of a corticosteroids. Los Alamitos’s license application will instead be taken up at the December meeting.

In regard to the corticosteroid restriction, CHRB chairman Dr. Greg Ferraro said that the board plans to extend that rule to all tracks in the state, including Santa Anita and Del Mar.

* Also at the meeting, Dr. Arthur indicated that the state’s recent implementation of a ban on bisphosphonates has become complicated by recent findings that the drugs can be detected in post-race tests “years” after they have been administered.

“Due to the unique property of this drug, which is to bind to bone, which is why we are so concerned about bisphosphonate abuse, we have been able to find this drug years after it has been administered,” Dr. Arthur said. “This will create an administrative challenge especially when other jurisdictions have not taken such a restrictive approach to bisphosphonates.”

Bisphosphonates have been banned in horses younger than 4 years old in many racing jurisdictions and by all of the major sales companies in the U.S. due to concerns that the drugs could have negative impacts on bone strength when administered to young horses. In recent months, some research has showed that if a horse is administered the drug when their bones are not going through a remodeling process, the drug can linger in a horse’s system for more than a year, according to racing officials.

In California and in many other racing jurisdictions, bisphosphonates are classified as a prohibited substance, a class that triggers the most severe penalties in the sport. The drugs are authorized by the FDA to treat navicular disease in horses that are at least 4 years old.

California’s ban on bisphosphonates became effective on July 1.