Doctors perform one-of-a-kind ultrasound at uShaka Marine World
Veterinarians at the South African Association for Marine Biological Research performed a water ultrasound using an underwater ultrasound machine on a pregnant Thorntail Ray, who was oblivious to the fact that a medical check-up was being performed on her.
THE South African Association for Marine Biological Research (SAAMBR) has performed the first of its kind – a water ultrasound using an underwater ultrasound machine. SAAMBR veterinarian Dr Francois Lampen joined his colleagues, Dr Justin Hart and Dr Ryan Daly, on the Open Ocean Exhibit, armed with the ultrasound machine.
It was the first time the doctors were able to carry out an ultrasound on any of the fish, sharks and stingrays in their care while the sea creatures went about their day, oblivious to the fact that a medical check-up was being performed on them.
After noticing that one of their Thorntail Rays was pregnant, they saw a perfect opportunity to perform the one-of-a-kind ultrasound. “We knew that one of the Thorntail Rays was pregnant as we could see her ‘bump’, but we were unsure exactly how far along she was. As she generally spends a fair amount of time resting on the bottom of the exhibit (as rays do), we were confident that we would be able to hover over her long enough to capture a video and images of her embryos.
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“Even though we were confident she was pregnant, when we actually saw three healthy embryos wriggling around on the ultrasound monitor, we could hardly contain our excitement,” said Dr Hart.
The doctors said they were not only excited to see the embryos on the ultrasound but also that they could now study and better understand the embryo development of Thorntail Rays.
“By using this novel method of monitoring the gestation period over multiple pregnancies, we will be able to get a better understanding of their embryonic development. This method is non-invasive and doesn’t require sedation which means we can monitor them on a frequent basis,” said aquarium curator Dr Hart.
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According to the doctors, they look forward to using this ultrasound tool going forward so they don’t have to worry about sedating or restraining animals whenever they need to perform examinations on them.
“Going forward, we will hopefully be able to use this technique to monitor the organs of other animals in our care without having to either sedate or restrain them in any way,” said Dr Lampen.
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