Today was another quiet day, but I still got a chance to see a couple interesting procedures and events occur. The most interesting procedure that I viewed was on a dog with gastrointestinal problems. The veterinarians believed that he had eaten some foreign object that he shouldn’t have as dogs sometimes do. However, they did not have to surgically remove anything. They had to put him under anesthesia (the image of the machine is pictured below) and they used a camera on a long tube to insert into his mouth and go through his digestive system. The camera tube device, called an endoscope, was connected to a television monitor that showed the camera’s view. As the endoscope snaked through the dog’s digestive system, I got to observe the inside of the organs involved in digestion. When they reached the duodenum, which is the part of the digestive system right before the small intestine, the observed the aggravated tissue. It was red and covered in small white bumps, which looked similar to how a sore throat looks. Using a small tool in the end of the endoscope, they took some samples of the tissue in the duodenum. They also used the same tool to take samples of healthy tissue in the stomach. While they could not find any large foreign object, they found a small unknown object that they decided to remove. After many attempts to grab it with the tool, they were finally able to remove it. It appeared to be a small piece of plastic that the dog had eaten. I really enjoyed seeing this procedure since it gave an opportunity to see the inside of an animal without needing surgery and it was an unforgettable experience to have.
