Contact: Tania Banak, University Relations Specialist
608/263-6716, banakt@svm.vetmed.wisc.edu
Date issued: March 28, 2008
Dr. Simon Peek, a large animal internal medicine specialist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Veterinary Medicine, uses the hospital’s new three-meter endoscope to examine a horse’s stomach for ulcers. The length of this endoscope allows veterinarians at the University of Wisconsin to perform comprehensive examination and diagnostic procedures of the entire stomach and proximal small intestine even in very large horses.
MADISON – When a horse has digestive tract or respiratory problems, doctors need a long tube to get all the way inside to see what’s going on. That’s why veterinarians at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Veterinary Medicine are so pleased to have a new three-meter endoscope, donated by Morrie Waud, one of the hospital’s clients.
“Now we can examine a horse all the way back to the duodenum, in the small intestine,” says Dr Simon Peek, a large animal internal medicine specialist at the school’s Large Animal Hospital. “Before, our endoscope would only reach to the stomach. But in horses, ulcers often occur further back than that.”
An endoscope is a long, flexible tube with a cold light source at one end and a viewing scope at the other, allowing doctors to see the insides of the esophagus, stomach, intestines, or nasal passageways. But standard-sized endoscopes are incapable of reaching far enough into a large horse, such as the draft horses Morrie Waud owns, to fully see what is occurring in the stomach and beyond.
The new three-meter endoscope remedies that.
An additional advantage of the new system is the ability to store images. While diagnosis of a problem is still done real-time, moving videos or still images can now be saved digitally. This permits veterinarians to compare images later to see whether progress is being made or to share them with students for teaching purposes.
Common problems that can benefit from endoscopic examination can include ulcerations of the esophagus, stomach or duodenum; respiratory tract infections; or urinary tract and bladder disorders.