CT Scans Added to Washington State University Vet School's Equine Imaging Options

A Quarter horse mare recently underwent a spiral
CT scan to examine a mass near one of the
carotid arteries leading to her head

Washington State University's Veterinary Teaching Hospital (VTH) has installed a new spiral computed tomography (CT) scanner for use in both small and large animals, with funds donated by a generous family. 

The VTH has had a CT scanner for more than two decades and a magnetic resonance imaging machine (MRI) since 1996.  With the new Toshiba Aquilion 16-slice spiral CT unit operational, both MRI and CT in WSU's veterinary college are among the most advanced complementary tools for diagnostic imaging in the profession. 

 "Before the new CT, we only imaged a few horses a month  (using CT), but now I would expect to do 10 times that," said Professor John Mattoon, a board certified veterinary radiologist and chief of WSU's diagnostic imaging section.  "There were limitations with the old technology that hampered its everyday use, but the new CT is truly state-of-the-art, with brand new software that greatly improves its capabilities.  Our goal is to examine 100 horses a year with the CT, and several small animals a day."

Speed is one of the new CT's main features.  It can scan 1750 millimeters (mm) or about 5.75 feet of a patient's body in 1 mm slices in 38 seconds.  Twelve images per second are displayed and all 1750 digital images are delivered within three minutes.  The machine's resolution can "see" details as small as 0.35mm; a little more than 13/100ths of an inch.  The imaging is produced in a variety of planes as well as in three-dimensional representations of anatomic structures. A small animal can often be imaged in the new CT scanner in seconds, in many cases without general anesthesia.

"A horse with a complex fracture was examined with the new CT in early June and it was completed in a couple of minutes," Mattoon said.  "The anesthesia and prep-work it takes to get the horse into the machine takes much longer than the actual exam.  By comparison, MRI may take an hour or more. Still, these two imaging modalities are complementary to each other, and one does not necessarily exclude the use of the other."

Horses are too large to fit entirely in the CT scanner, so only the head, upper neck, and lower limbs are imaged.  For smaller animals, the entire body can be scanned, and is especially useful for examining the lungs and abdomen.

"CT scans are the first choice in human medicine for imaging the lungs and abdomen, and I think it should become the standard of abdominal imaging in smaller animals as well," said Mattoon, who has practiced radiology for more than 25 years.    

As a result of the CT's speed, animals have to spend much less time under anesthesia, if at all.  "For horses, we can use a short-acting anesthetic, and some small animals can just be sedated without undergoing anesthesia," Mattoon said.  "This is an important advancement because there are always risks associated with anesthetizing an animal.

"Overall, CTs at WSU should be less expensive because exams take less time and anesthesia.  This particular new CT scanner should also open up a whole new area of research, including vascular imaging and shunt studies. I imagine that in the beginning we will do a lot of cases in which we use both CT and MRI."

This brief video showcases Washington State's new CT service, as illustrated by the Quarter horse with the cartoid artery mass that needed to be imaged.

Information and elements for this article are the property of Washington State University.

19 June 2010 | Fran Jurga's Hoof Blog at Hoofcare.com

© Fran Jurga and Hoofcare Publishing

Please, no use without permission. Fran Jurga's Hoof Blog is a between-issues news service for subscribers to Hoofcare and Lameness Journal. This blog may be read online at the blog page, checked via RSS feed, or received via a digest-type email (requires signup in box at top right of blog page). To subscribe to Hoofcare and Lameness (the journal), please visit the main site, www.hoofcare.com, where many educational products and media related to equine lameness and hoof science can be found. Questions or problems with this blog? Send email to blog@hoofcare.com.

What a Day for the USA...and a Rough Day for One Appaloosa

Thanks to Florida artist Debbie Sampson for the loan of this patriotic image. Debbie has a clever twist to her paintings: that's a real horseshoe attached to the (painted) hoof. Please note that they do sell stars-and-stripes leg wraps for horses; this painting does not represent real flags wrapped around horses legs!

This image seems sadly appropriate: As you may have heard, a horse in the inaugural parade somehow managed to get his leg stuck in or under a parked truck. The Appaloosa was extriciated and ambulanced through the masses in downtown Washington. You can read the Humane Society of the United States's story about it at this link. It was a joint effort between the HSUS and other animal welfare agencies.

I know: my first thought was to question whether the horse was properly shod for the parade. I tried to find out in advance what advice had gone out to horsemen for preparing their horses' hooves for safety on the street. No one had any answers for me.

I know that ambulances and evacuation trailers were on hand, supplied by the HEART ambulance seen at so many east coast horse shows and three-day events, and the Days End Farm Equine Rescue Farm in Maryland. I am not sure who transported the horse, but I am so glad they were there.

A note to all the farriers and farrier organizations out there who read this blog: your skills with handling horses could be put to great use in the field of equine rescue and disaster relief. The HSUS and other agencies offer rescue training courses, and there are more formal programs and even certifications available, if you would like to be on call for stand-by at events or for disaster situations.

Helping staff and outfit a horse ambulance in your area is a great fundraiser goal for horse groups of all types, as well.

But if my horse was trapped upside down in a trailer or stranded on a hummock in the middle of a flood, I know that I would relax a tiny bit if I knew the person trying to help was a farrier who would have some sense of the horse's reflexes, and be able to assess a situation.

Many vets are already lined up in some sort of a network to help. I don't know who the state police calls when there's a wreck, or a horse falls down a hole, but the vets are already there. And could use a hand.

Another area where farriers can help is teaching local fire departments how to bandle horses in barn fire situations. And reminding owners to set up their barns so horses can be evacuated by firemen who don't know where halters and leadlines are kept (they should be hanging by each stall). Do you think the firemen in your town can put halters on horses in the dark?

President Obama called us all to action yesterday, and to serve. Perhaps with budget cuts to state and national programs, animal rescue training and fundraising is something we could all do to help.

That Appaloosa in Washington is certainly glad those trained personnel were on hand.

© Fran Jurga and Hoofcare Publishing. No use without permission. You only need to ask.

Fran Jurga's Hoof Blog is a between-issues news service for subscribers to Hoofcare and Lameness Journal. This blog may be read online at the blog page, checked via RSS feed, or received via a digest-type email (requires signup in box at top right of blog page).

To subscribe to Hoofcare and Lameness (the journal), please visit the main site, www.hoofcare.com, where many educational products and media related to equine lameness and hoof science can be found.

Questions or problems with this blog? Send email to blog@hoofcare.com.