Dr. Scott Madill
Dr. Scott Madill, BVSc, DVSc, is the UMEC specialist in equine reproduction (theriogenology), supervising breeding, caring for problem pregnancies and delivering babies.
“I really love embryo transfer and obstetrics” he said. “Compared to other species, foaling is such an explosive event that when things go wrong they have to be resolved quickly for the foal to survive, while maintaining the health and future fertility of the mare. A difficult foaling is a great challenge.”
Farm life down under shaped Madill’s choice of a specialty from the beginning-- his extended family farmed outside Sydney, Australia.
“My grandfather bred trotters-- none of them terribly fast— starting in Sydney when it was less built-up than it is now,” he said. “My first contact with horses would have been as a kid with them, offering treats after he had worked them. Later, when he retired to the farm next to my uncle’s, we would stay there for school holidays, and I’d get to drive them back up to the stable and help untack them and wipe them down.”
His first pony was a twelfth birthday present.
“Flash was cute as a button but probably a bad choice as a first pony,” said Madill. “He was only 2½ years old – I spent a fair bit of time flat on the ground looking up at the sky. We kept him at my grandparents’ farm until we got our own, and I’d be galloping around the training track on the pony after ‘Pa’ when he trained his trotters.”
Holidaying on these small farms, Madill and a pack of cousins enjoyed working with the sheep and cows and survived adventures that included “hopping on ponies after dark with no saddles or bridles, chasing each other around and lots of falling off,” he recalls.
Local veterinary care was in short supply at the time, and that combined with economics meant the family mostly had to do what they could to treat their own cows, horses and sheep.
“The first time I wished I was a veterinarian I was about 13, and my pony got colic,” he recalled. “We were a fair way from town, and the only vet wasn’t around. So I walked him for hours. He survived, but I wasn’t game to go and look the next morning till somebody else had.”
Madill attended an agricultural high school where he debated whether to major in veterinary medicine or agricultural science.
“I decided I enjoyed working with animals more than sitting on a tractor,” he said, so he completed his veterinary degree at the University of Sydney in 1985. His favorite subject before clinics started was physiology because it explained how things worked, he said. “And all of the medicine and surgery courses were interesting once you got to be hands on.”
“In the final year we got exposed to Professor David Hutchins for horse medicine and surgery—he was a bit of a legend-- and Dr. Marsh Edwards in obstetrics,” said Madill, who subsequently enjoyed an internship at the University’s Rural Veterinary Centre in 1986 under Hutchins’ supervision. This lead to an associate position in thoroughbred track practice at Randwick Equine Center, the largest track practice in Sydney.
“Randwick was a phenomenal experience, and I learned a huge amount from the senior vets,” he said. “ Many of those horses were great athletes and the trainers, farriers and grooms weren’t only professionals to work with but they taught me a lot as well.”
Madill knew that eventually he wanted to wind up as a country town vet, but he was also at a good time of his career to look at some overseas experience first.
“Upper level surgery didn’t seem likely to be of much use out in the bush, but I thought I could always use reproductive medicine, and I was fascinated by stud farm work,” he explained.
He went on to complete a residency in reproductive medicine at the University of Guelph, Ontario where he met Dr. Erin Malone (now his wife and UMEC team member).
His biggest culture shock at Guelph was the difference in Australian and Canadian sheep values.
“My first job in Canada was a caesarian on a ewe, and I said ‘how much are we charging?’ It was $85. When I left home in Australia sheep sold for $1 a head!”
Returning to Australia, Madill worked in a clinic in Bowral, New South Wales that treated large and small animals as well as backyard poultry and a few more unconventional patients.
“The Wildlife Information and Rescue Service would bring us the occasional kangaroo or wombat,” he said. “My father almost disowned me when I told him I had treated a wombat that day – they spend their time digging up his paddocks.”
He moved to St. Paul and the University of Minnesota in 1995 where Dr. Malone was a doctoral student having completed her surgery residency. And he began studying uterine defense mechanisms in mares.
“Pregnancy rates in horses have improved mostly due to better management of breeding and especially since the advent of ultrasound in the last twenty years,” said Madill, “but the number one cause of infertility is still uterine problems.”
Another change in his field is the steep rise in demand for genes from top performing stallions.
“It used to be a full book for a stallion was 40 mares a year, now some Kentucky stallions breed well over 150 mares, and that takes intensive management” he said.
“I’m really looking forward to working in a facility actually designed with horses in mind,” said Madill of the new Leatherdale Equine Center. “Poor performance evaluation and rehabilitation are greatly improved here, and so is reproduction. We now have state of the art semen freezing equipment, so we can adjust freezing rates to find the optimum for each stallion. The new facility is safer for breeding and for stallion collection because of its separate entrance and the well padded teasing area. We’ve also upgraded and expanded our capacity for examining semen with new types of microscopes and have camera monitoring for expectant mares.”
“What all this does is allows us to give a better level of service for clients,” said Madill. “This is a state of the art place for staff to do their work, and with the equipment and the people comes the ability for us to advance veterinary knowledge.”
|
Dr. Scott Madill is board certified by the American College of Theriogenologists |