Search Results for “surgery”

New research reveals that brachycephalic dogs are most susceptible to corneal ulcerative disease. The cornea is the outermost layer of the eye and must remain transparent to support vision.

Things are moving fast in the world of feline pathogens. The authors of a recent review article in the Journal of Feline Medicine and Surgery say “the rate at which novel [or previously unknown] viruses are being discovered now exceeds our understanding of their clinical relevance.” And it’s not just happening to cats: A 2008 paper in Nature described the discovery of 335 infectious diseases in the global human population between 1940 and 2004.

“There aren’t many true emergency diseases in veterinary medicine, but GDV is one of them,” said researcher and veterinarian Dan O’Neill, a veterinary epidemiologist at the Royal Veterinary College. GDV (gastric dilation and volvulus), better known as canine bloat, is one of the top killers of dogs. And it can come on fast.

An anesthesia technician at the Colorado State University Animal Cancer Center felt she could predict a dog’s level of pain based on acute radiation effects. This hunch eventually led to a study on pain scores as related to acute radiation scores (ARS). “When the skin has a specific change, we found that in general, it would predict that the animal’s pain level would be increased within a few days,” said Susan LaRue, DVM, DACVS, DACVR, one of the authors of the study. “One of the main principles of pain management is not to let the pain become bad before you start medicating.  So now we have enough data to know when to start pain medication.” The team also found that one scoring system was more useful than another when measuring radiation therapy-related pain.

In the veterinary school setting, various materials are used to simulate skin and muscle tissue in order for students to practice incisions and sutures. Practice materials have included raw chickens, rubber sheets, orange rinds and even pieces of carpet padding. Now, veterinarians from Colorado State University’s Veterinary Teaching Hospital (VTH) have created what they hope Is the best alternative to real tissue. VTH Director Dean Henderson, DVM, DACVS, and research scientist Fausto Bellezzo, DVM, invented a type of artificial tissue that simulates sections of animal anatomy including skin, muscle, fascia and even blood. "We had been concerned that the distance between the didactic training our students received and the first live animal surgery was too great,” Hendrickson said. “We felt like we needed something that might more closely mimic normal tissue in both characteristics and the ability to ‘bleed.’”

It was a lightning strike heard ’round the world. And the man it struck is alive and well today (along with his three German shepherds) thanks to the quick thinking and CPR training of staffers at AAHA-accredited Stuebner Airline Veterinary Hospital in Spring, Texas, just north of Houston.

With its new surgical suite, New York’s Schwarzman Animal Medical Center (AMC), is cutting-edge in more than just technology. Their approach to teaching, intentional hospital design, and wellbeing have made AMC the place where patients go when others say it “can’t be done.”

A group of animal and human cancer doctors has lofty goals for its new project, the National Veterinary Cancer Registry, which helps to find clinical trials for cats and dogs that have been diagnosed with cancer.

Veterinarians might want to advise elderly clients to exercise even greater caution while driving when they have their pets in the car. A University of Alabama at Birmingham study indicated elevated crash risks for drivers over the age of 70 who regularly have pet passengers in their cars.

Last week, the University of California at Davis (UC Davis) announced the full recovery of Tiny Tim, a 40-year-old desert tortoise. The tortoise had undergone an ovariosalpingectomy over a year ago to remove three of six remaining eggs lodged in the tortoise’s reproductive tract.