Epicur Pharma, a division of Stokes Healthcare and leading 503B outsourcing facility of veterinary medications, is proud to announce the addition of omeprazole injection suspension for horses to its product portfolio. In partnership with the Bova group, a leading compounding pharmacy in Australia and a specials manufacturer in the UK, Epicur is bringing the same unique, proven formulation of omeprazole injection to the US for the treatment of equine gastric ulcers.
Equine gastric disease, an umbrella term describing two different diseases in the horse’s stomach, Equine Squamous Gastric Disease (ESGD) and Equine Glandular Gastric Disease (EGGD), is very common, and equine veterinarians have been treating the disease for decades with an oral paste administered daily. Epicur’s release of omeprazole as an injection offers veterinarians an innovative alternative for equine gastric ulcers. Benefits of this formulation over the traditional oral paste include:
- Much more profound and consistent acid suppression compared to oral treatment (Sykes et al., 2017) and, as a result, consistently better treatment responses in published studies
- Improved compliance with medication as only one injection is required every 5 to 7 days, rather than oral administration (Rendle and Gough, 2024)
- No need for withholding feed or other medications prior to administration (in contrast to oral treatments)
- More rapid healing with ESGD healing in 10 days and EGGD in 20 days with the injection, compared to the traditional month of treatment with oral treatment (Sundra et al., 2024)
- Clinical cure in situations where oral treatment has shown very poor efficacy (Rendle and Gough, 2024)
- 100 percent manufactured following FDA-enforced regulations
Stokes Healthcare and Bova first partnered in April 2024 to give US vets and pet owners access to regulated treatment for cats with FIP with a mission to improve animal care globally. Epicur president Michael Tursi said of the latest partnership for injectable omeprazole, “We are excited to introduce another of Bova’s groundbreaking drugs—this time to equine vets across the US We partnered with Bova because we were impressed by their years of dedicated research and the clinical studies that back their unique formulations. The omeprazole injection suspension is truly a game-changer for equine gastric disease.”
Epicur’s omeprazole injection is now available to ship nationwide, with only 1 to 2 business days in transit. Learn more about the formulation and how to order it here.
