When are endoscopies used to treat dogs?
Multiple cases. I think one of the times we use it most would be if dogs have swallowed something, a foreign object, and it is lodged in their stomach. We can see that on other imaging modalities like x-rays. We see that object there, and it is something that we think we can grab with an endoscope. The scope allows us to put pinchers or baskets down and grab those objects. So sometimes we can go in endoscopically and actually get out foreign objects out of stomachs without requiring surgery. It's obviously less invasive for your pet, obviously better. So that would be the first, sort of obvious, thing we use it for.
The second is a little more in-depth. Dogs and cats, but dogs, can have some complex gastrointestinal diseases that need diagnosing, which we sometimes cannot diagnose with other forms like x-rays, ultrasound, or blood tests. So sometimes we actually have to visualize the small intestine. Again, the scope is put down the throat, it goes down the throat and the esophagus, into the stomach, and into the first part of the small intestine, or even the large intestine going up in the colon. We cannot reach all of the intestine, but we're able to visualize the inside of that intestine, look for abnormalities, and take biopsies of that intestinal wall. This helps diagnose some diseases that could be going on with that intestinal tract.
Dr. Kevin Ashbran
Newport Harbor Animal Hospital
Why are endoscopies important?
Great question. I think that it adds to our toolbox. You know, everything we do diagnostically has pros and cons about it. Endoscopy, x-rays are wonderful—we take a lot of x-rays—but sometimes we can't see everything we need to. So I think endoscopy gives us another avenue to visualize the intestinal tract or parts of the intestinal tract that we don't have with other modalities. Again, x-ray and ultrasounds are great; we use them a lot, but they aren't perfect. Endoscopy also allows us to get biopsies of those parts of the intestine that we would otherwise have to do surgically, which is a lot more invasive. So it allows us to diagnose, see things that we can't otherwise, and do things in a little bit of a safer manner.
What problems can be diagnosed with a dog endoscopy?
Great question. Diagnosed? Well, often with endoscopy, if we know there's a foreign object, we're not really diagnosing it—we're going in to grab it or try to grab it. So I wouldn't say that's a diagnosis. But when we're looking to do endoscopy in dogs for diagnostic reasons, we're looking for diseases that cause vomiting, diarrhea in your pet, that are causing your pet not to eat or lose weight. So GI diseases, gastrointestinal diseases, esophageal diseases. When you enter the mouth and go down the esophagus, then go into the stomach, and then that first part of the small intestine, you're going to see gastrointestinal ulcerations or even gastrointestinal cancers, and other diseases that may cause abnormalities of the ability of the intestine to absorb or digest food. We can see those.
Endoscopy is imperfect—it's limited. Remember, you're looking in the small intestinal tract, so if things are on the outside of the small intestine, you're not going to be able to see them. But hopefully, our other modes of imaging—x-ray and ultrasound—would find those. This helps us to actually visualize the inside of the intestinal tract, which will then give us some more answers and allow us to take biopsies. The main ones are looking for diseases of digestion, which can include food allergies, ulcerations, and unfortunately, cancers.
What will the veterinarian be looking for during the dog endoscopy?
Abnormalities of what the intestinal wall looks like. We know what the inside of an esophagus, stomach, or small intestine is supposed to look like. So we see abnormalities in color, if there's a mass growing, an ulcer, or something different than normal. We're looking for those abnormalities, looking to biopsy those areas, and help give us an answer to diagnose the disease that's causing the clinical signs we're seeing in your pet.
Do I need to take my dog to a specialist for an endoscopy?
Need? It's a great question. I would say need, no. Absolutely, you can do that. There are veterinary internal medicine specialists who do endoscopies more frequently than we do. They're very skilled; that is a skill that they have. Here at Newport Harbor Animal Hospital, we have veterinarians who have done endoscopies for quite some time. We are a general practice, but it is something we're comfortable with and feel very qualified to do. However, there are plenty of internal medicine specialists in the area who do a very good job with it, and we do refer to them for certain cases. But in general cases of trying to retrieve foreign bodies or get a diagnosis, we feel that our doctors here are capable of doing that.
Will my dog need anesthesia to undergo an endoscopic exam?
Yes, unfortunately, our dogs aren't going to sit still and let us pass a long scope camera down their throat. So we do need to go under general anesthesia. This allows us to easily pass the scope from the esophagus to the stomach, and into the intestine or colon if we're doing a colonoscopy. It is something that requires general anesthesia to ensure safety for the pet and the equipment being used.
How should I prepare my dog for an endoscopy?
Great question, Brittany. If you meet with your veterinarian and they determine an endoscopy is recommended for your pet, they'll walk you through how to prepare your pet. Usually, here at Newport Harbor, because it is an anesthetic procedure, you're going to want your dog fasted. So they should not eat after dinner the night before, and water should be taken away in the morning. You'll show up at our practice early in the morning with the pet fasted. You'll get checked in by our team and meet with the surgical technician, who happens to be Brittany. They'll walk you through the procedure and what the day will look like. Other than that, it's pretty simple. If your pet is on certain medications, the doctor will advise you on whether to give those or not.
Will my dog need any special treatment to recover from an endoscopic procedure?
Another great question. It's pretty simple. One of the reasons we do endoscopies is that it's less invasive than a surgical procedure. They will have general anesthesia, so they'll go home a little groggy that evening. They'll have some limitations on diet that evening and exercise for the next day or two, but after that, the recovery is pretty simple. With our endoscopic procedures here at Newport Harbor, we often send some medications home for the GI tract. Sticking a camera down the dog's throat and into the stomach can sometimes irritate the esophagus and stomach, so sometimes we send some GI protectant medication home for a few days to a week to treat the gastrointestinal tract as nicely as possible. Other than that, recovery is quick, and that's one of the reasons we prefer it over surgery. It has limitations, but if we can use endoscopy instead of surgery, that's a big reason we do it—the recovery is a lot faster.
If you have any other questions, please give us a call at (949) 612-2756. You can also email us at [email protected] and we will get back to you as soon as we are able. Don't forget to follow us on social media: Facebook and Instagram
Dog Endoscopy - FAQs 1
Dr. Kevin Ashbran
Newport Harbor Animal Hospital
How can I help my dog prepare for an endoscopy?
I think if you saw our other video, we talked a little bit about it there, but if not, it's a surgical, it's an anesthetic procedure that's going to require general anesthesia. So we're going to want them fasted. They can eat dinner the night before and then after about, you know, nine o'clock the night before we're going to stop feeding them, they can have water through the night, pull water in the morning. They're going to get here at the hospital early in the morning. They're going to get checked in by our team and our surgical technician who happens to be Brittany will go through the procedure and what to expect for that day. So it's basically just fasting overnight to get through the upper GI tract, so the esophagus, the stomach and the intestinal tract. If we are doing a colonoscopy, it can be a little more involved, which, and you would get detailed instructions from your veterinarian. But just for the endoscopy procedures, just to be fasted, we need the food out of the way basically is what I'm trying to get at. No food in the stomach or the small intestine so we can see things better.
Will my dog receive pain medication before an endoscopy?
Yes. Part of our anesthetic protocol here at Newport Harbor does involve a small pre-anesthetic medication that happens to be a pain medication. Endoscopic procedures and endoscopy procedures are not inherently painful. One of the reasons, again, we like them, they're less invasive than a surgical procedure, but it does help us achieve a good level of anesthesia and it does prevent any kind of discomfort that scope may cause by irritating the lining of the esophagus and stomach. So yes, they will receive a pain medication.
What happens during a dog endoscopy?
Great question. Your dogs are put under full general anesthesia. So again, you get checked in during the day and I'll sort of walk you through the day. The doctor will do a pre-anesthetic exam on your pet, make sure, again, nothing's changed and they're healthy again for anesthesia. An IV catheter will be placed so we can give medications and so your pet can receive IV fluids. IV fluids will be started. Your pet will then be put under general anesthetic by the cervical team, the doctor and the technician. Your pet will be monitored with the most high-tech monitoring equipment. We monitor blood pressure, EKG, oxygen saturation, CO2 saturation, blood pressure, just like a human would be monitored under anesthesia. And then they would be placed in a room like this, our surgical suite, with our endoscope placed on their side and the doctor and the tech would monitor anesthesia and the doctor passes the scope through your dog's mouth into the esophagus, which connects the mouth to the stomach. And when you do that, you look for any abnormalities and then into the stomach, look for any abnormalities if, again, we can reach with the scope into that first part of the small intestine. When the procedure's done, if we needed to collect biopsies, we would. We would put a forceps down, collect pinch biopsies of the intestinal or stomach wall and submit those to the laboratory. If we're in there trying to do a foreign body retrieval, again, we would use those forceps to grab the foreign body and remove it. Afterward, we'd remove the camera and wake up your pet from anesthesia and the technician would monitor your pet during the wake up.
Who gives my dog the anesthesia for an endoscopy?
The doctor does. Here at Newport Harbor Animal Hospital, again, we're a surgical team of two or more people. Sometimes endoscopies require somebody to work the forceps, so sometimes there's three people. But the person who gives the anesthetic is the doctor here and the tech, again, we have one person monitoring at all times, one person working the camera at all times, and that's the doctor. The doctor does anesthetize your pet in the beginning, help them get ready. And then if we do need the forceps used, again, that would be the third person of our team. But the doctor is the person on the team that does administer the anesthesia.
How will my dog be monitored during an endoscopy?
We talked about that a little bit. I'll just quickly go through that again. Obviously, anesthesia is serious, and we take it very seriously here at Newport Harbor Animal Hospital. So again, our dedicated team, that's all they're going to do at that moment. So the doctor and the technician are going to monitor the anesthetic equipment, make sure the machine is set up right, and we have all the right doses of medications. But during the procedure, they will be monitored, their blood pressure will be monitored, their heart rate and rhythm will be monitored with an EKG, their oxygen saturation will be monitored, their respiratory rates will be monitored, CO2 levels will be monitored, just like you would in a human hospital. And again, we dedicate a team just to that. And there's a person in the anesthetic suite and surgical suite just to do that and monitor your pet. So we're not, again, missing anything. We take anesthesia very seriously, and we want to make sure your pet is as safe as possible.
Are there any risks or side effects associated with the dog endoscopies?
The risks are minimal. That's one of the reasons we like them and prefer them. Obviously, they are, like we've talked about in other questions and other videos, they are much less invasive than a full exploratory surgery. But general anesthesia always has risks, and one of the reasons we do pre-anesthetic exams and pre-anesthetic blood work at a minimum is to make sure your pet is safe to go under anesthesia. And we minimize those risks. In certain pets with other diseases or certain pets of certain ages, we may also do other testing, x-rays or ultrasounds to make sure they're safe to go under anesthesia. So anesthesia is the biggest concern with an endoscopy, and again, we do everything we can to minimize those risks here at Newport Harbor Animal Hospital. Some of the other complications, risks are going to be pretty minor. Again, some irritation may happen with the esophagus or stomach from passing the camera down the esophagus or stomach or intestines. If we take biopsies, some of those areas of the intestinal wall may be a little irritated or sore or inflamed for a little bit of time, a few days to a week. So often, we will send home some medications to mitigate that, some gastrointestinal protectants to help limit that. Other than that, the risks are pretty minimal.
If you have any other questions, please give us a call at (949) 612-2756. You can also email us at [email protected] and we will get back to you as soon as we are able. Don't forget to follow us on social media: Facebook and Instagram