Soft Tissue

Gemma, a 7 year old Border collie, presented with a history of removal of the spleen in the previous year at the referring practice, and now had had a solitary large hepatic mass observed on an ultrasound scan.

After trauma like road traffic accidents, ruptured diaphragm can occur and abdominal contents including intestines and liver can move through into the chest cavity. The reduced volume available for the lungs usually leads to significant respiratory distress. Occasional cases however have surprisingly minimal clinical signs.

This is a relatively common problem seen by us in Burton-Upon-Trent, usually affecting older un-castrated male dogs but occasionally affecting female patients.

Cats can have great difficulty passing faeces through a narrowed pelvis, resulting from pelvic fractures left to heal naturally after trauma from road traffic accidents etc.

One Friday afternoon, a general practice some miles away had a problem:

Ear disease usually reflects local skin disease. Skin micro-organisms (bacteria and yeasts) love nothing more than warm moist nooks and crannies so the ear canal can make an ideal environment for them.

Charlie, an 8-week-old Labrador puppy was presented to us at West Midlands Veterinary Referrals with a history of regurgitation and vomiting once he made the change from liquid to solid food intake.

Princess, a 2-year-old Yorkshire terrier was referred to us at West Midlands Veterinary Referrals with a history of bladder stones and hepatic encephalopathy (neurological signs) attributable to the effect on the brain of toxins that the liver should have “scrubbed” out of the “dirty” blood coming from the intestines. An abnormal blood vessel called a shunt underlay the formation of the bladder stones and the shunt allowed toxins to get to the brain.

The soft palate is at the back of the mouth. For those who remember the Peanuts cartoons, the soft palate is the dangly bit you can see when Lucy throws her head back and yells at Charlie Brown!

This condition involves the formation of draining tracts around the anus. It is often seen in German Shepherd dogs, and causes discomfort and straining with defaecation.