My impression, from a UK veterinary perspective, is that lung ultrasound (LUS) gets variable press. Specifically, most specialist cardiologists don’t much care for it. It’s useful to understand why this is. It’s no coincidence that LUS was discovered and developed primarily by human acute care physicians in intensive care units (ICUs) and emergency departments. Looking … Continue reading
Firstly, a young CKCS with PCR +ve Pneumocystis pneumonia: this dog had a history of masticatory muscle myositis managed successfully with chronic steroid therapy until he recently developed severely increased respiratory effort. There are widespread lines perpendicular to the pleurae. As discussed in previous posts, the appearance of abnormal lung lines on ultrasound is … Continue reading
Our understanding of the complexities of canine acute pancreatitis continues to develop through a revealing series of recent publications. Secondary gastrointestinal changes in acute pancreatitis: J Vet Intern Med 2022 May;36(3):947-956Prevalence of ultrasonographic gastrointestinal wall changes in dogs with acute pancreatitis: A retrospective study (2012-2020)Joshua J Hardwick, Elizabeth J Reeve, Melanie J Hezzell, Jenny A … Continue reading
The use of intra-operative ultrasound in canine shunt surgery has been described previously: J Am Vet Med Assoc 2003 Apr 15;222(8):1086-92, 1077Intraoperative ultrasonography of the portal vein during attenuation of intrahepatic portocaval shunts in dogsViktor Szatmári 1, Frederik J van Sluijs, Jan Rothuizen, George Voorhout https://avmajournals.avma.org/view/journals/javma/222/8/javma.2003.222.1086.xml The authors of that study interrogated the main extrahepatic … Continue reading
With the advent of lung ultrasound and the resulting great leap forward in our ability to diagnose bronchopneumonia relatively easily and with good specificity has opened a door on its true incidence and the spectrum of associated presenting signs. Notably, we now see affected dogs in which gastrointestinal signs are prominent. It’s hard to prove … Continue reading
As I might have said before, lung ultrasound is the gift that keeps on giving. In the beginning lung ultrasound wasn’t even a thing; then it became all the rage and we recognised some fundamental patterns. With time we’ve worked out some more subtleties and developed new understanding of concepts that we previously thought we … Continue reading
This is a very niche observation but something that I’ve not seen described elsewhere. In cats without any evidence of gastrointestinal disease there is often an asymmetrical thickening of the small intestinal mucosa at the jejuno-ileal junction. This is located between 1.5 – 4.0cm proximal to the ileo-caeco-colic junction. https://www.cabdirect.org/cabdirect/abstract/20123064781 Before I realised that this … Continue reading
It’s been a while since my erstwhile mentor Dr Bob O’Brien published this nice article: Vet Radiol Ultrasound Jul-Aug 1998;39(4):354-6Urinary bladder mural hemorrhage associated with systemic bleeding disorders in three dogsR T O’Brien, E F Wood https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9710141/ …and ultrasound technology has moved on a bit in the meantime. This is a recent case of the … Continue reading
Ultrasound elastography, or elastosonography, is increasingly available on high-end ultrasound machines;. At the most basic level USE gives an indication of tissue stiffness. This may be either in response to mechanical pressure (strain imaging) or to ultrasound-generated compression (shear wave elastography). Mechanical pressure in strain imaging is exerted externally (manually) or by internal changes due … Continue reading
The patient here is a 3 y.o. FN mini Schnauzer with bilateral ureteral calculi and plasma urea >40 mmol/L, creatinine 500umol/L. This patient very likely had pyelonephritis (UTI is present in something like 80% of dogs with ureteral calculi…much more so than in cats) although she lacked signs of sepsis. The interesting thing is … Continue reading
