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We are lucky in our area to have state-of-the-art equipment for diagnosis of our pets' illnesses. Carolina Veterinary Specialists are the only veterinary specialty hospitals with on-site CT machines.
CT stands for “computed tomography.” In people, CT scans are used to help doctors non-invasively diagnose and treat medical conditions.
The scans combine x-ray-type equipment with computers to produce cross-sectional images of the body. The doctor can study these images to diagnose the patient.
As pets have become part of many families, CT scans are increasingly used to diagnose and treat medical conditions in our animals.
CT use in veterinary medicine is more available than some other non-invasive treatments. If a vet practice does not have its own CT, often it will use the ones available in most veterinary schools, or in a mobile CT unit.
They may use a machine in a human hospital during nights or weekends. It is common for animals to be referred to Carolina Veterinary for a CT scan from their regular vets.
Carolina Veterinary's first CT scanner has been at the south Charlotte hospital location since 2003. The CT scanner at the Lake Norman location has been in place since early summer.
Initially, Carolina's CT scanner was used mostly to diagnose brain disease and disc disease or other spinal-cord problems in cats and dogs. (Dogs with long bodies and short legs, such as Dachshunds, sometimes have these problems.) Now CTs can help doctors diagnose many additional different diseases in animals.
Neurology still uses CT for spinal and brain disease. Internal medicine and oncology use CT to diagnose lung and nasal disease. Ophthalmology uses CT to diagnose problems around or behind the eye. Surgery uses CT to diagnose elbow or shoulder problems, lung disease and some kinds of traumatic injuries.
Dr. Lauren Powers, my ferrets' vet, has done a CT on a rat with an ear abscess, a ferret with a mass in her head, a wild rabbit and a pet rabbit with tooth problems, and a cockatoo with a lung tumor.
Powers said Carolina Veterinary Specialists is “very excited to be able to offer this service to our patients because it's one technique to evaluate that we didn't have before.…We can see things in fine detail, like an ear abscess in a rat.… (The CT scan) takes a very short time period, just three to five minutes.”
She explained that with a CT scan, unlike an x-ray, the doctor receives a three-dimensional image that she can manipulate on the computer to rotate and look at from various sides, such as front to back or top to bottom, etc.
For example, with the rat's ear abscess, an x-ray would show only changes in the bone or an excessive amount of fluid built up in the ear.
But with CT scan you can see fluid and ear tissue in much more detail.
According to the vets at Carolina Veterinary, the only real disadvantages of CTs are that they require most animals to be sedated and the process is not inexpensive. At the Huntersville hospital, CT scans start at about $800.
Most of us, however, would spare no expense to keep our animals healthy and happy.
Freelance writer Lisa Daidone lives in Cornelius. E-mail her at ldaidone@charlotteobserver.com.
