Many people have encountered ultrasound either personally or with your pet. This is an incredible technology that has made diagnosing problems and evaluating illnesses and structures within the belly of our pets a very helpful part of diagnostic work ups.
For those who aren’t familiar, ultrasound scan uses high-frequency sound waves to create images of the inside of the body. Ultrasound technology has grown considerably and, as I mentioned above, has become an invaluable addition to our diagnostic capabilities in veterinary medicine. One of the greatest aspects is that ultrasound is very non-invasive. It’s very safe and typically done on awake patients though it may require mild sedation if they are uncomfortable. The most invasive thing we have to do is clip their belly fur to allow us to get good diagnostic images. In many cases we use ultrasound alone or to complement x-rays which are great in showing you if there are any obvious abnormalities, but ultrasound takes it one step further. Looking at the structure and architecture of the organs within the abdomen to look for subtle abnormalities that may be indicative of current or impending disease issues. It was ultrasound that let us know little miss Patty was pregnant with those adorable little pups!
I am very excited about how much I have learned and look forward to not only learning more, but being able to help our patients - the more efficient we can be in getting the answers we need the quicker we can help our pets to feel better!
Please don’t hesitate to contact us if you have any more questions or want to learn more!
Dr. Covert