20 November 2025 Thursday
SPECIALIST DAY
Please note that the Specialist Day is fully booked, when you finalized your registration for the congress you can send us an email to be added to the waitinglist for the Specialist Day: info@eceim-congress.com
Venue: Novotel Liverpool Paddington Village, right next to the spine building
Time: 09:00-17:30
"Is it a wibble or a wobble? Advances and Enigmas in Equine Neurology"
— A Specialist Training Day for Equine Internal Medicine Diplomates
Event Summary:
Join us this November for a dynamic, high-level training day designed exclusively for equine internal medicine specialists with a passion for neurology. Whether you're confident in your cranial nerves or still haunted by hindbrain mysteries, this day will push your knowledge, sharpen your lesion localisation skills, and open the floor to lively, peer-level debate.
We’re bringing together some of the brightest minds in equine neurology and diagnostic imaging:
- 🧠Dr Monica Aleman (UC Davis) – internationally recognised for her ground-breaking work in equine neurology
- 🧠Dr Caroline Hahn (University of Edinburgh) – expert in equine neuroanatomy and lesion localisation
- 🧠Dr Richard Hepburn (B&W Equine Hospital) – respected for his work on sports horse spinal compression cases
- 🧠Dr Jonathan Dixon (Rainbow Equine Clinic) – a board-certified imaging diplomat with a keen eye for neurological subtleties
- 🧠Dr Dave Stack (University of Liverpool) – equine surgeon bringing surgical insight into neurologic case management
- 🧠Dr Rachel Tucker (Liphook Equine Hospital) - Equine surgeon with a special interest in cases of cervical dysfunction and specialising in minimally invasive neck surgery.
What to expect:
- Live case discussions: from classic wobbler to clinical red herrings
- Advanced neuroanatomy & lesion localisation workshops
- Small-group imaging review: bring your questions and your clinical instincts
- Surgical options and decision-making in neck and spinal cord disease
- Hands-on head & neck dry model: practical training in a small-group setting
- Panel debates and open forums with global experts
From confusing cases that mimic wobblers to genuine surgical candidates, this day dives deep into the cutting edge of equine neurology, sparking discussion around evolving best practices and how specialists are managing these cases.
Come sharpen your skills, challenge your thinking, and reconnect with colleagues tackling the most perplexing and rewarding cases in equine medicine.
WORKSHOPS
Venue: Spaces at the Spine
Morning Workshops
09:00-12:00
Getting the most from cytology - a case-based workshop
Alastair Foote
Blood gases
David Bardell
In this workshop we will stary by reviewing some basic theory relevant to sample acquisition, blood gas and acid-base analysis and the different approaches to interpretation. We will then work through some examples to put theory into practice.
Afternoon Workshops
14:00-17:00
Forget the inside of horses, what’s going on inside people’s heads? Exploring human behaviour in equine medicine
Tamzin Furtado and Shona Bloodworth
This workshop will introduce the science of human behaviour change – why we believe the things we believe, how we take on new information, and how we change our actual behaviour. We’ll explore how this might impact working with clients in the veterinary setting, and how we can research human behaviour in order to create interventions and bring about real-world change.
Microbiology laboratory led antimicrobial stewardship: from sample taking to treatment decision
Dorina Timofte and Flavia Zendri
The goal of this workshop is to provide equine clinicians with an opportunity to interact with veterinary microbiologists, to review the current practices both on the clinic and laboratory side, and work together to improve bacteriology results. Increased and improved clinician communication with the diagnostic laboratory is a key element of the recent WHO concept of “Diagnostic stewardship”, which refers to coordinated guidance and interventions aiming to improve the use of microbiological tests to guide therapeutic decisions. In line with this principle, this session will include interactive talks and workshop style discussion around clinical cases. You will have the opportunity to hear from experts in the field, with lectures supported by practical examples and case-studies enabling discussion around “best practice” for processing clinical specimens for bacterial culture, species identification and antimicrobial susceptibility testing (AST). Besides touching upon specimen collection and processing, in the first part of the workshop, the focus will be on interpretation of AST results generated by disc diffusion and minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC), impact of clinical breakpoints updates on AST results reporting, and diagnostic led antibiotic stewardship practices to improve prescribing. The 2nd part of the workshop will have a clinical focus, discussing antibiotic selection based on AST results to refine and improve antibiotic prescribing.