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Figuerola Laboratories, of Santa Ynez, California, was founded in 1992 by Dr. Rossana Figuerola and her late husband Alfonso Figuerola, and is a world leader in the manufacture of 100% pure, pharmaceutical-grade nutraceuticals targeting specific ailments in people, horses, and pets, in environmentally-safe packaging. It has earned worldwide recognition for pioneering development of therapeutic supplements, including NutraSaver® and EquineSaver® superfoods for humans and horses.
It also represents a family where science and wellness walk hand-in-hand. Veterinary science division president, Dr. Rossana Figuerola, was born in Peru to a family of German/Swiss/French and Jewish descent. Her father’s work, in laboratories and health insurance companies, kept the family traveling across much of South America.
“As a girl, I called my father’s work ‘old people stuff.’ I wanted to go another way.” She moved to the United States as a teenager and began modeling and designing award-winning jewelry inspired by her native Peru: “I was in California yet winning recognition in New York!” Embracing that American entrepreneurial spirit, she became a U.S. citizen.
Her greatest adventure lay ahead: a Peruvian horseman with an exquisite herd of foundation mares cherished for their brio -- that intangible inner flame that separates the great from the ordinary. Meeting Alfonso would one day test the depths of Rosanna’s own brio.
Alfonso Alejandro Figuerola Saavedra was born in 1945 in Pacasmayo, Peru, the descendent of two (Figuerolas and Saavedras) of the original families instrumental in establishing the Peruvian Horse breed.
Early in their courtship, he asked if she owned a pair of boots. “I was a model. Of course, I told him, I had lots of boots.” The next morning, he picked her up for a date. “I was wearing beautiful, high-heeled boots, and he said you look lovely, but your boots are all wrong!” After choosing a more practical pair, they drove to his hilltop hacienda. “We went in the barn and he opened the stalls. These beautiful mares came out and went right up to him. I fell in love immediately.”
With the mares and the man. Over the years, the couple launched several business ventures, from fine jewelry, to luxury saddles and gourmet coffee imports.
Then Alfonso, while still in his 40s, had a stroke, leaving him almost paralyzed, and in constant pain. “He felt trapped in his body. I took a sabbatical from the design industry and promised him he would ride again.”
The prognosis was not optimistic. The lessons of her father came back to her: “I remembered what he showed me in his laboratory. I thought about Alfonso’s pain, and how my father called his work ‘the medicine of the future’.”
Rossana had left the laboratory a rebellious girl and returned as a determined wife: “That’s how our first product, JointSaver®, was born. Almost immediately, InflammaSaver® for humans was created. Both were crucial for my Alfonso’s recovery because InflammaSaver® prevented pain and inflammation, by preventing the manufacture of enzymes that promoted inflammation, and JointSaver® started the rebuilding process.”
Alfonso regained his ability to walk and ride. “He amazed his doctors with a 99% recovery from paralysis, and became pain-free.” During recovery, he asked to see his horses. While at the farm, he noticed one aging broodmare, Angel, suffering from arthritis.
“We looked at each other and knew we could help. That’s how we developed JointSaver® Equine.” As for Angel? “She was cured, and lived happily ever after until she was 32 years old.”
Alfonso died in 2005, but thanks to his wife, reclaimed 14 years of an active equestrian lifestyle. “Until the day he died, he took JointSaver® and InflammaSaver®.”
Changing Alfonso’s and Angel’s lives changed Rossana, too. She left jewelry design to lead the company’s veterinary science division. “The family name on a product means I have twice the responsibility to those who use it. I am a human, doctor, and horse owner. People are looking for the same results that I would.”
Figuerola Laboratories represents three generations of dedication. “Our sons, Antonio and Alejandro, share the family passion for promoting good health.” Their product line includes EquineSaver® an all-in-one superfood with 300+ compounds. “The organic flax seed and rice bran multi-vitamin and mineral supplement offers probiotics and supports functions, from cardio to glandular, and eye health.”
Another is LaminaSaver® whose active ingredient, Restaurex®, and antioxidant properties enhance cell regeneration and help sensitive hoof laminae injured by founder or laminitis, restore, rebuild, and regenerate. In Canada, veterinarians named LaminaSaver® the “best medicine and therapy” for treating laminitis. Horse Journal reviews proclaimed: “We’ve never seen anything like it for treating chronic laminitis. All our testers agree it’s worth the price.”
“My mission,” Dr. Figuerola says, “is to save horses’ lives; to see that no horse is euthanized because of a diagnosis when hope is still available.” Take it from a woman whose life has been all about hope, health, horses and lots of brio.
For more information about Dr. Figuerola and Figuerola Laboratories, visit www.Figuerola.net , www.Figuerola-labs.com , www.EquineSaver.com , www.ilovemyfiguerola.com , www.ilovemyfiguerola.net
805-688-6626