Photo By Rebecca Perron | 170224-N-GM597-062 Portsmouth, Va. (Feb. 24, 2017) Debbie Chepan, radiologic...... read more read more
While the Norfolk Naval Station Veterinary Activity (VETAC) provides state-of-the art care for the region’s Military Working Dogs, sometimes these dogs need advanced imaging such as computerized tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), capabilities not available at the vet clinic.
That’s when the Radiology Department at Naval Medical Center Portsmouth (NMCP) steps in, providing CT scans or MRIs for Military Working Dogs that may have certain conditions, but veterinarian X-rays are insufficient for diagnosis. In the past two years, radiology staff has provided assistance in at least 15 cases.
The most recent case involved Military Working Dog Anoeska, an eight-year-old German shepherd who is undergoing a workup for lumbosacral disease and degenerative joint disease. Early in the morning, before any human patients arrived for imaging, the veterinary team and a Navy dog handler brought Anoeska to radiology. The 3D imaging would help the team determine if Anoeska can continue to serve.
“I’m the veterinarian assigned to her case,” said Army Capt. Sean Stockwell, the branch chief of VETAC and Anoeska's case manager. “Through NMCP, because they are treated as a service member, we have access to advanced diagnostics and imaging techniques that we don’t have at the clinic. We’re able to use MRI, CT and other capabilities if we needed to.
Stockwell said that back injuries, usually a lumbosacral or a thoracolumbar spinal injury, are the main cause for bringing the dog to NMCP. How many times each dog requires imaging depends on the injury.
“It might be just once, but if we are working up some other muscular skeletal injury, it could potentially be multiple times,” Stockwell said.
The vet team immediately went to work preparing Anoeska for the scan, which involved sedating her to ensure she didn’t move during the procedure.
“The typical scan takes about five to 10 minutes,” said Debbie, NMCP radiologic technologist. “Most of the appointment time is spent preparing the patient – putting them to sleep and getting them positioned correctly. We lay the dogs on their back in a V-shaped sponge to get them into the proper position since dogs don’t normally lie on their back.”
Chepan said that she translates her training for humans to the dog’s scans.
“It’s about the same as taking human scans, except the anatomy is smaller and the dogs need to be sedated,” Chepan said. “The first time I scanned a dog was strange because I was not used to it, but the dogs have similar bones – their spine looks just like a human spine only smaller.”
While Anoeska was sedated, Chepan took hundreds of images, checking with Stockwell to ensure she had captured the areas of concern to his satisfaction.
“We take images of the entire spine in different planes – axial, coronal and sagittal,” Chepan said. “The benefit of taking scans in different planes is to be able to build the 3D image.”
After the imaging is complete, Stockwell will send them to a team of veterinary radiologists at Lackland Air Force Base for review.
“We’ll send the scans to the Holland Military Working Dog Hospital at Lackland Air Force Base, where it will be reviewed by veterinary radiologists and they will make their recommendations,” Stockwell said. “We also put a package together and submit it to the dog’s command and the command makes the decision, as well as the program managers at Lackland. They are the Department of Defense executive agent for the Military Working Dog Program.”
Stockwell said the process is similar to a medical board for service members who are injured and may not be found fit to return to duty.
“When we have medical dispositions, it’s similar to a medical board for a sailor or soldier,” Stockwell said. “We look at their overall case and make a determination, along with consultations with our specialists, as to what actions can be taken to continue their service, or it it’s reached the point where they cannot perform their job anymore.”
Factors that contribute include whether their condition can be rehabilitated or if their pain can be controlled. If not, according to Stockwell, the dog may be retired or may be suitable to serve in a different way, which can be as a detector dog or work with the Transportation Security Administration at an airport.
In addition to specialty care and the medical board process, the veterinarians provide routine care similar to human service members.
“In our program, because of their lifespan and the type of work they do, we do two annual physicals, like for service members who have a physical health assessment,” Stockwell said. “The dogs have medical readiness categories just like service members, so we manage their care very much in the same way. We see them twice a year and perform annual blood work. Once they are older than eight, we’ll do annual electrocardiograms and other bloodwork as needed. We monitor them very closely for injuries or disease progression.”
| Date Taken: | 03.17.2017 |
| Date Posted: | 03.17.2017 14:09 |
| Story ID: | 227232 |
| Location: | PORTSMOUTH, VIRGINIA, US |
| Web Views: | 242 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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