Trust to the fore by working quietly behind the scenes

The chances are that if you’ve ever visited the Animal Health Trust (AHT), it will have been in fairly traumatic circumstances. From pet cats and dogs right through to thoroughbred racehorses, the trust is often the final port of call when other veterinary avenues have been exhausted.

Staff never really know what to expect. One morning a terrier might be treated for cancer, the next could see a fabled racehorse anaesthetised ahead of critical surgery. It was Professor Edwin James Roberts, an AHT vet, who performed the pioneering operation that saved Mill Reef in 1972 after the great horse shattered a foreleg out at exercise.

That really was a breed-shaping moment. Mill Reef would sire two Derby winners in Shirley Heights and Reference Point, while his daughters went on to produce numerous top-class runners. His premature death would have obliterated what was a vibrant chapter in the history of the modern thoroughbred.