Ultrasound
Ultrasound equipment is a very helpful tool in diagnosing conditions in your pet. We use ultrasound to see in many areas of the body with better detail than we can see with x-rays. Ultrasound is very safe to your pet and it can be done in many cases with no sedation. We commonly use ultrasound technology in the following ways:
Evaluate the heart
Ultrasound is a better tool for evaluation of the heart than x-rays. With x-rays, you get a size reference of the heart, but you can't measure the individual wall thickness, the ability to contract, the valve size and shape. This additional information is important in deciding if you need to have your pet on heart medications. You can evaluate these things with ultrasound. Chest x-rays are important with heart and lungs disease because ultrasound will not evaluate lungs well.
Guiding Biopsy Samples
We can use the ultrasound to guide small biopsy tools to take samples of organs that are not functioning correctly to ensure the sample can be taken safely. Liver disease is very common and the lab work often does not define the cause of the elevated liver enzymes. We use the ultrasound to get liver biopsies for diagnosis and treatment of liver disease, so you can be accurate with your liver treatments.
- Dr. Sherrell performing an ultrasound
Look inside the abdomen
X-rays will give you a relative size of organs, but has some limitations on giving you the detail of the shape and the texture of the organs. You can look at each organ individually and evaluate if it is abnormal. Ultrasound is a great tool for checking the appearance of the liver, stomach, spleen, kidneys, pancreas, adrenal glands, intestines, and bladder. The ultrasound is a very good tool for checking for tumors in the abdomen. Bladder disease is extremely common in cats and dogs. You can look inside the bladder for bladder stones and growths. You can use the ultrasound to guide a fine-gauge needle to sample some urine to look for infection and crystals.
Pregnancy
We commonly ultrasound pregnant mothers to see if the puppies or kittens are developing normally. We also can get a fairly accurate count of the number of the puppies or kittens you can expect. This also has the advantage of no radiation exposure to the mom and the babies.