Healing Aman’s eye at the mobile clinic

Animal owner Eremias Getachew, aged 43, uses his horse Aman to get around in the mountainous area of Debre Brehan in Ethiopia and to help him collect essential goods, such as firewood.

Eremias recently noticed Aman had a sore eye. He wasn’t sure what had caused the problem, but Aman kept rubbing his eye, which was closed and weeping, so Eremias took him to SPANA’s mobile clinic, which regularly visits the area, as soon as he could.

He was very concerned as for working animals like Aman, their eyes are extremely important. SPANA Ethiopia country director Dr Nigatu examined Aman and flushed out his eye with sterile saline. He could not see any obvious cause, but he diagnosed the horse as suffering from uveitis (an inflamed front part of the eye).

To treat it, he gave Aman a painkiller and anti-inflammatory injection and gave Eremias some anti-inflammatory eye drops to give to his horse twice a day for a week. He also advised Eremias to clean the discharge regularly and keep flies away from the eye, and that if it didn’t get any better, to come back to the clinic.

Eremias thanked SPANA and Dr Nigatu saying: