Finally A Patient of My Own!

Today was the day I finally got another patient of my own.  My patient is an older border collie who has been coughing recently and seemed to be having trouble swallowing.  We did an exam, took radiographs of the dogs entire airway, ran bloodwork, and also did a swallow study.  In a swallow study, contrast material is fed to the dog and then fluoroscopy (essentially a live, continuous x-ray) is used to watch the material being swallowed by the dog.  The rads, bloodwork, and swallowing study all turned out normal.  So, we plan to to a laryngoscopy +/- a bronchoscopy tomorrow.  This means we will put a scope down to the dogs larynx and check it out and if we feel we need to we will stick the scope down the dogs windpipe and into his bronchi, the tubes that carry air into the lungs.  Should be cool to see if we find anything!