Interesting Saturday In Radiology

I saw two really neat cases while working in radiology Saturday that tied into case presentations we've gotten in block 3. The first was a dog with NSAID toxicity-- it was getting a blood transfusion and had melena. Made sense to me. Decreased prostaglandin production as a result of inhibiting cycloxygenase enzyme 1 (cox-1)-- those prostaglandins are protective for the gut.

And then I saw a dog with an adrenal mass, likely pheochromocytoma (the other differential was a carcinoma but the dog was showing clinical signs consistent with a pheochromocytoma). What was neat is I had left ultrasound to go take some radiographs and when I came back in everyone was looking at an image on the screen of Doppler blood flow around a mass but I wasn't sure at first where the mass was. Judging from its proximity to the kidney and some other markers, I guessed and asked if it was a pheochromocytoma. I was happy to be able to figure out what I was looking at on ultrasound without anyone orienting me anatomically. And it was only the second case I'd ever seen. We had a mini-case that involved a pheochromocytoma in class recently so that made it even more neat.