Speaker 1: Mother Knows Death Presents External Exams with Nicole and Jimmy.
Speaker 2: Hi everyone, Welcome to Mother Knows Death on Mother Knows
Speaker 2: Death Instagram and the Grocerroo. And we always talk about
Speaker 2: autopsies on people, but we never talk about autopsies that
Speaker 2: are done on animals. On this week's external Exam, we
Speaker 2: will be talking about animal pathology and forensics. An animal
Speaker 2: autopsy is also called a nekruptcy and they're performed by
Speaker 2: trained veterinarians who specialize in anatomic pathology. Today we will
Speaker 2: be speaking with doctor Allison Watson, who is a veterinary
Speaker 2: anatomic pathologist and assistant professor at Colorado State University Veterinarian
Speaker 2: Diagnostic Laboratories. Welcome, doctor Watson. How are you.
Speaker 1: I'm great, Thank you so much for.
Speaker 2: Having me, Thanks so much, Thanks so much for being here.
Speaker 2: Like I have a million questions for you, So we're
Speaker 2: going to get started. Before we start talking about your
Speaker 2: really really cool and interesting job, let's first start talking
Speaker 2: how you got into the field of veterinary medicine.
Speaker 1: I think I'm pretty similar to a lot of people
Speaker 1: that you asked that question. I from a really young age,
Speaker 1: I loved animals, so I feel like that was kind
Speaker 1: of the first career that I had in mind. And
Speaker 1: I also had an aunt that I'm really close with too,
Speaker 1: was a veterinary tech technician, so that kind of inspired
Speaker 1: me to go that route as well. I feel like
Speaker 1: most students that I ask, I'll say, oh, I've always
Speaker 1: wanted to be a vet from loving animals as kids.
Speaker 2: That's really cool. So did you get to go to
Speaker 2: work with your with your aunt when you were younger
Speaker 2: and see what she did every day?
Speaker 1: I did it a little bit. My family always had animals.
Speaker 1: We always had dogs and casts that we brought and
Speaker 1: we brought them to the clinic that she worked at.
Speaker 1: But I didn't start doing any real shadowing or anything
Speaker 1: until I was in high school and actually getting ready
Speaker 1: to graduate and go to college.
Speaker 2: All right, So I know how the field of medicine works,
Speaker 2: for example, just going to medical school. First you have
Speaker 2: to go to college and you have to go to
Speaker 2: medical school. Then you have to do residency fellowships and
Speaker 2: things like that. Is it the same for the field
Speaker 2: of veterinary medicine or how does it work? Like after
Speaker 2: you graduate high school, what do you do?
Speaker 1: It's pretty similar. We go and go and get a
Speaker 1: bachelor's degree first, usually in some science field, just because
Speaker 1: it fulfills all of the prerequisites. For most veterinary schools,
Speaker 1: they all tind of have a little bit variation in
Speaker 1: prerecs prerequisites, but like my bachelor's biology and zoology, so
Speaker 1: kind of a basic science bachelor's degree. I had a
Speaker 1: few students in my class that didn't end up getting
Speaker 1: a full bachelor's degree. They got all the prerecs done
Speaker 1: and three years and then applied to med school and
Speaker 1: were able to go. But I think there's maybe at
Speaker 1: least three in my class with one hundred and forty people.
Speaker 1: So after graduating with bachelor's degree, then you apply to
Speaker 1: veterinary school, so same thing like medical school, and then
Speaker 1: it's another four years four years of veterinary school, with
Speaker 1: the clinical year being kind of the last year year
Speaker 1: and a half where we're actually rotating through a large
Speaker 1: hospital and all the different specialties. And then where it's
Speaker 1: a little bit different from human doctors is that at
Speaker 1: that time veterinarians can take the board exam. We take
Speaker 1: that in our last year, and then you can go
Speaker 1: out in practice in clinics. So most of the time
Speaker 1: the veterinarian that's going to see your pets, your dogs
Speaker 1: and cats or even horses. Is they're not specialized necessarily,
Speaker 1: so you can just go out and start practicing where
Speaker 1: most or all human doctors do residency training after. It's
Speaker 1: not a requirement for veteran muans. But if you want
Speaker 1: to specialize, become a pathologist or any of the other specialties,
Speaker 1: then we apply again for internships usually so one year
Speaker 1: rotating internship through again similar to our clinical year where
Speaker 1: you rotate through all the different specialties in a large
Speaker 1: hospital and then go on to a three year residency program.
Speaker 1: So pathology is just a little bit different than that
Speaker 1: where we don't have to do the internship part since
Speaker 1: we're not going to be practicing clinical medicine on living.
Speaker 1: We can just kind of go straight from veterinary school
Speaker 1: to residency. So that's what I did.
Speaker 2: At what point did you decide that you were interested
Speaker 2: in pathology as opposed to taking care of and you
Speaker 2: do you call them patients? Still, we do.
Speaker 1: We often call them cases, but I mean they are patients.
Speaker 2: Yeah, of course, that's interesting.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So I started at school wanting to be a
Speaker 1: zoo vet. So either work in a zoo or work
Speaker 1: in private practice with exotics, pet birds and pet pet reptiles.
Speaker 1: I really like birds and reptiles, so that's kind of
Speaker 1: what I started wanting to do when I was When
Speaker 1: you're working on applying to veterinary school, you have to
Speaker 1: get a lot of veterinary hours or volunteer animals with animals,
Speaker 1: so you know, volunteering at animal shelters are different at
Speaker 1: rescue have places, and then vet clinics as well. So
Speaker 1: when I was working on that, I volunteered at the
Speaker 1: rapture So Bird of Prey rehab Center near where I
Speaker 1: went to college, and I was able to do e
Speaker 1: dropsies there. So that's kind of my first exposure to
Speaker 1: what an ecropsy was, and at that time, I still
Speaker 1: didn't know that that was a career that anyone did.
Speaker 1: I thought it was just something that you did when
Speaker 1: animals die, and other veterinarians do this too, but I
Speaker 1: didn't realize that there were veterinarian pathologists until I started
Speaker 1: vetering school. So our first year of school, we take
Speaker 1: kind of all their theology courses, so an adamy, physiology, virology, bacteriology,
Speaker 1: and then we also have our first pathology course, and
Speaker 1: that was kind of my first exposure to Wow, people
Speaker 1: do this as a career, and it really excited me
Speaker 1: in a way that clinical medicine didn't, which is kind
Speaker 1: of It was kind of a scary feeling when I
Speaker 1: started at school, like, oh, I've wanted this my whole life,
Speaker 1: but it's not really speaking to me as much as
Speaker 1: I wanted it to to be a zoo vet. But
Speaker 1: as soon as I started delving into what pathology was
Speaker 1: and what pathologists do for their job, it's kind of
Speaker 1: light bulb going off my head, like this is a
Speaker 1: perfect marriage of science and medicine and for me. So
Speaker 1: I think by the time I was halfway through schools
Speaker 1: when I was one hundred percent going home, I'm going
Speaker 1: to be a pathologist and kind of go down that route.
Speaker 2: I love that story. It sounds very similar to mine,
Speaker 2: Like I started school to be a nurse and was like, I,
Speaker 2: this is definitely not for me, and then I found
Speaker 2: pathology and was like, Okay, this is definitely I could do.
Speaker 2: I could help people still, and I could work in
Speaker 2: healthcare but not have to deal with the live people.
Speaker 2: So getting to that question, is there any ever a
Speaker 2: point that you see live patients anymore or are you
Speaker 2: only seeing parts of them or when they die?
Speaker 1: Yeah, and pretty much don't see any live patients. Our
Speaker 1: lab is connected to the Veterinary Teaching Hospital that has
Speaker 1: all of the all the specialties housed in it, so
Speaker 1: if I needed to, I could go over there and
Speaker 1: look at the patient. I do so. A particular interest
Speaker 1: of mine is dramatic pathology, so pathology of the skin.
Speaker 1: So I do meet with with our clinical dermatologists pretty
Speaker 1: frequently and at least see photos up there living patients,
Speaker 1: but I don't usually meet them in person.
Speaker 2: That's awesome. Yeah, of course you want to see all
Speaker 2: that stuff because you're you're a pathologist, so it makes sense,
Speaker 2: do you so? In human medicine, we have positions like mine,
Speaker 2: which is a PA, and we're the ones that dissect
Speaker 2: all the organs that come down from surgeries, and we're
Speaker 2: also the ones that perform the eviscerations for the autopsies.
Speaker 2: Is there a similar position for someone like that in
Speaker 2: your field or is that something that you just handle
Speaker 2: completely yourself.
Speaker 1: It definitely depends on what lab you work in. At
Speaker 1: our lab, so we have three full time necropsy technicians
Speaker 1: that can't help us if we want, so I've mentioned
Speaker 1: and introduce me assistant professor. So we teach vetter nearing students,
Speaker 1: so they're required to learn how to don cropsy as
Speaker 1: part of their training. So we're teaching veterinaring students on
Speaker 1: our cropsy floor. So we often have them doing doing
Speaker 1: the actual exam to learn. But if we're really busy
Speaker 1: or it's late in the afternoon or something, then my
Speaker 1: technicians can help or I'll have them do the full exam. Uh.
Speaker 1: And then as far as surgical specimens, we do have
Speaker 1: a whole separate team of technicians that do all of that,
Speaker 1: the gross exam on those specimens and trimming into cassettes,
Speaker 1: and then I go up to our histology lab.
Speaker 2: That's interesting, So do you do you have a separate
Speaker 2: histology lab for the vet medicine or do you just
Speaker 2: send them over to a medical one and they just
Speaker 2: caught them.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we have our own right in house, just down
Speaker 1: the hall from my office. So we have a we
Speaker 1: have I think we have like five or six full
Speaker 1: time techs in there, and we do our own aminum history,
Speaker 1: chemistry and special stating as well.
Speaker 2: All in I'm really interested in this actually, because so
Speaker 2: if you want to do if you want to be
Speaker 2: a veterinarian, histotech, if you just want to do animal specimens,
Speaker 2: do you have to have the same or do you
Speaker 2: even know this? You have to have the same certifications
Speaker 2: as one that would work in a hospital.
Speaker 1: You don't. They can, But as far as I know,
Speaker 1: I don't think our technicians do. But I have known
Speaker 1: a few at another place I worked and where I
Speaker 1: did residency that did that certification. But we for some
Speaker 1: of our technicians, we just require a bachelor's degree in
Speaker 1: a science field, but then others we don't, and then
Speaker 1: we do all of the on the job treating.
Speaker 2: That's that's good to know because I always say this
Speaker 2: on every single interview almost that I know all of
Speaker 2: these people that have a bachelor's degree in science and
Speaker 2: they don't know what they can do with it, right,
Speaker 2: And this is just another example of a cool kind
Speaker 2: of job that you could get working in a lab
Speaker 2: with that kind of degree. So thanks for sharing that.
Speaker 2: That's really interesting. So can you give us an example
Speaker 2: of some of the type of specimens and necruptcies that
Speaker 2: you do at work on a day to day basis.
Speaker 2: You don't have to give us your craziest case or
Speaker 2: anything like that, but just more of an example of
Speaker 2: the types of things that come across your desk every day.
Speaker 1: Sure, and this can vary greatly depending on the time
Speaker 1: of year. But I was actually just one knee cropsy
Speaker 1: service yesterday, so I'll just give you an example of
Speaker 1: what we saw yesterday. We had two cats, two three dogs,
Speaker 1: and a rooster all in the same day. So but
Speaker 1: you know, other days we might get a fours a cow.
Speaker 1: We do get exotics or zeus species, so we might
Speaker 1: get a pet perry, a couple of chickens. We usually
Speaker 1: see anywhere from five to ten cases per day in
Speaker 1: knee crompsy. So I looked this up because I can't
Speaker 1: remember exactly, but I think we see around seventy five
Speaker 1: percent dogs and cats in our lab, and then out
Speaker 1: horses and then sheep and goats, some cows, and then
Speaker 1: all the rest. So by far we're seeing mostly dogs
Speaker 1: and cats at our lab, but that can definitely vary
Speaker 1: on the part of the country that you're in, or
Speaker 1: if you're in a more rural area where see a
Speaker 1: lot more livestock, pigs and that type of animal. So
Speaker 1: that's nee propsy. Our surgical biopsy service is really busy
Speaker 1: at Colorado State. So we get around you know, ninety
Speaker 1: to one and twenty cases a day. It is.
Speaker 2: That's a lot of surgical cases, actually it is, yep.
Speaker 1: So and that's just not all from our hospital, so
Speaker 1: we get a lot from the rest of the state
Speaker 1: and other states. We get cases sent to us from
Speaker 1: Japan even so we just have a pretty busy labs.
Speaker 1: We have four to five pathologists on surgical scheduled every
Speaker 1: day to take cases, and then we have one pathologist
Speaker 1: with residents on our nee cropsy service.
Speaker 2: This is really mind blowing to me. Honestly, you're busier
Speaker 2: than a hospital some hospitals that I've worked at, actually,
Speaker 2: which is insane. It makes sense. So you're seeing specimens.
Speaker 2: Let's say, for example, you take your dog to the
Speaker 2: vet and they have a tumor and they say they
Speaker 2: want to take a biopsy of it so you can
Speaker 2: figure out if it's benign or malignant. Like that would
Speaker 2: be something that you would get yep. And what would
Speaker 2: drive an that cropsy for an animal because for example,
Speaker 2: like one of my best friend's dogs just died about
Speaker 2: a month ago, and she she was. She's a pa
Speaker 2: actually too, so she's very curious as to what happened
Speaker 2: because she came home and the belly, the baby or
Speaker 2: the baby, the dogs, her baby, the belly was distended.
Speaker 2: And then they said that she might have had a
Speaker 2: spleen tumor that ruptured and it looked like it was
Speaker 2: filled with blood on imaging, but she would have had
Speaker 2: to pay for the autopsy. So she kind of of
Speaker 2: just like, what's the difference? I don't need to get it,
Speaker 2: but is that normally what drives these cases is the
Speaker 2: family wanting to know or do you do it for
Speaker 2: scientific purposes?
Speaker 1: Both? So I'd say cases that we get from from
Speaker 1: outside submission so at our lab, and I think most
Speaker 1: labs are like this. Owners or the pet owners are
Speaker 1: allowed to submit me dropsy so we don't have to
Speaker 1: have a referral, so they can just bring their pet
Speaker 1: straight from home to our labs. So I think that's
Speaker 1: probably the majority of cases that we get. And usually
Speaker 1: it's it's that same scenario where their pet seemed healthy
Speaker 1: one day and then the next died suddenly, and they
Speaker 1: really want that closure to get an answer, and then
Speaker 1: otherwise it's for scientific interest or interest from our our
Speaker 1: clinicians in the hospital, So why did this dog that
Speaker 1: was doing so well on this treatment suddenly go downhill
Speaker 1: so fast and dye to determine extensive disease, so metastasis,
Speaker 1: and they suspect that there's metastasis from a malignant tumor,
Speaker 1: and they want to know what organ it went to
Speaker 1: and how bad it was. We do have clinical trials
Speaker 1: patients that we do need propsies on that are purely
Speaker 1: for research to see how the therapy was working. And
Speaker 1: then a lot of times there's concerns for infectious disease,
Speaker 1: especially in our large animals, so a herd health issue.
Speaker 1: People have chickens in their flock dying, they want to
Speaker 1: make sure that the rest of them are okay, or
Speaker 1: figure out disease process to treat other animals in the
Speaker 1: herd or flock. So it can be for a million
Speaker 1: different reasons, but I think pet owners often just want
Speaker 1: that closure and get an answer.
Speaker 2: Since you work at a teaching facility, do you try
Speaker 2: to because I've worked at a teaching facility for humans,
Speaker 2: do you try to kind of recruit the necropsies just
Speaker 2: so your students could have exposure to something that they
Speaker 2: might not ever see again in their career.
Speaker 1: We do, especially from the teaching hospital, so we encourage
Speaker 1: them to submit interesting cases or things that we might
Speaker 1: not see. It's fortunate. So in our at Colorado State,
Speaker 1: we do need propsies of patients through our hospital at
Speaker 1: no charge to the client. So we use a fund
Speaker 1: of money that comes from veterinary student tuition to pay
Speaker 1: for that. So it's there a patient that's been seen
Speaker 1: in the last six months to a year even and
Speaker 1: they die, then we'll do that at no charge to
Speaker 1: the pet owner. So we have a be high caseload
Speaker 1: because of that. But outside some measure, submitters that are
Speaker 1: not patients of the hospital do have to pay. But
Speaker 1: we've at least since I've started, I've been here almost
Speaker 1: five years, and we've never had, you know, a problem
Speaker 1: with having enough cases to teach students, and we've had
Speaker 1: the opposite problem where we have too many cases for
Speaker 1: the students to handle in one day. So I know
Speaker 1: that's different depending on what veterinary school you're you're working at,
Speaker 1: they may have very few cases and are recruiting a
Speaker 1: lot more actively. We used to accept donations, but we
Speaker 1: don't anymore. Just because we have such a high caseload.
Speaker 2: This is so interesting when when I do an autopsy
Speaker 2: on a person that the permission form is very important
Speaker 2: as far as what we're allowed to cut and who
Speaker 2: gives the permission. There's a legal next of kin who's
Speaker 2: the only one that's allowed to sign it. It just
Speaker 2: it gets very complicated times because for example, a husband
Speaker 2: would be the legal next of kim, but maybe one
Speaker 2: of the children really don't want the autopsy done, but
Speaker 2: we would still do it if the husband wanted it done. Right,
Speaker 2: So are there any kind of like who who gives permission?
Speaker 2: The owner? Do they have to give permission?
Speaker 1: Yes, so we need permissions. We have them sign a
Speaker 1: forum that giving us permission to do the new cropsy
Speaker 1: and that we're really careful about only releasing information to
Speaker 1: that person, So we need it written permission if they want,
Speaker 1: you know, they're veterarian to see the report or talk
Speaker 1: to the pathologists. So that happens a lot where one
Speaker 1: owner will submit and then maybe the husband will try
Speaker 1: to call to get information, but we're not able to
Speaker 1: release that. And then our cases from the hospital were
Speaker 1: a little bit more since those are often being used
Speaker 1: for research as well, or for clinical trials. We have
Speaker 1: a little bit more in depth form that they fill
Speaker 1: out where they give permission for tissues to be collected
Speaker 1: for research, or they can approve for the whole animal
Speaker 1: to be used for teaching our research. And this because
Speaker 1: we often have requests from teachers throughout Colorado State for
Speaker 1: maybe a whole limb or ahead of an animal to
Speaker 1: practice dentistry or to practice dissection on, and we wouldn't
Speaker 1: want to do that without written and sign consent of
Speaker 1: the owner of that animal. So we do have a
Speaker 1: little box that they can check where they're aware that
Speaker 1: we may use this entire dog for a dissection purpose
Speaker 1: we're teaching. So that's kind of nice that we're able
Speaker 1: to give the owners that ability, But otherwise we can
Speaker 1: use them signing. We can use tissues that we normally
Speaker 1: collect for an hrompcy that we might do this topology on.
Speaker 1: We can use that as part of a study if
Speaker 1: we want.
Speaker 2: That's that's so cool. This is just like really mind
Speaker 2: blowing because I never really thought about it, and I
Speaker 2: just I actually just wrote about a case in the
Speaker 2: gross room about animal forensics, which we'll get to in
Speaker 2: a few minutes. But I never really I just really
Speaker 2: never thought that this was all going on behind the
Speaker 2: scenes for animals as well. When I took biology in
Speaker 2: my undergrad we dissected a variety of animals, but they
Speaker 2: all came from like Carolina Scientific or whatever, and they
Speaker 2: were embalmbed and just smelled terrible. That smells just so terrible.
Speaker 2: So you're saying that your students have a big range
Speaker 2: of fresh animals to dissect or do they do them
Speaker 2: on fixed specimens too?
Speaker 1: They both, So in their first year they dissect partially
Speaker 1: fixed dogs that that we do that don't come in
Speaker 1: through ne cropsy, so they similar they purchase them from
Speaker 1: companies or we have some agreements with some of the
Speaker 1: local humane societies where if strays or euthanized, they can
Speaker 1: be donated. So they do have a full semester dissection
Speaker 1: class on dogs where small groups that our new students
Speaker 1: will dissect fixed animals and to identify all the muscle groups, nerves, DearS,
Speaker 1: and all of that. But then they throughout their education
Speaker 1: they have smaller group sessions where they'll practice surgical skills
Speaker 1: and joint injections on fresh tissues. So that's usually where
Speaker 1: we can they can utilize our neat cropsy lab for
Speaker 1: donated animals that way.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, it's way better to look at it
Speaker 2: fresh different, So I always prefer that too.
Speaker 1: Yep, are students is in their last clinical year, that's
Speaker 1: where they have to learn how to ne cropsy, but
Speaker 1: they often enjoy that rotation just to kind of review
Speaker 1: anatomies that they haven't thought about since their first year
Speaker 1: and see it fresh compared to fixed. So it's nice
Speaker 1: that we can let them do that.
Speaker 2: What's mind blowing about the field of batinary medicine to
Speaker 2: me is, for example, for humans, it's we have to
Speaker 2: learn one species of a mammal and then you guys
Speaker 2: have to know every single other animal in the entire
Speaker 2: animal kingdom. It's just and I know because from biology
Speaker 2: we dissected things all the way from like an earthworm
Speaker 2: to a lobster or something, and a fetal pig and
Speaker 2: a frog's completely different anatomy and all these animals. How
Speaker 2: do you guys learn all that?
Speaker 1: It's challenging, you know. We often say that's why veterinary
Speaker 1: medicine is more exciting than human medicine, just because we
Speaker 1: get to we are able to learn all these different
Speaker 1: different anatomies of all the different species. So, like I said,
Speaker 1: we in our anatomy course they do focus on dogs,
Speaker 1: which dogs and cats are really similar, and then kind
Speaker 1: of teach in different ways the anatomical differences between species.
Speaker 1: And then so focusing on for example, the rumin in
Speaker 1: or cow gastrointestinal system, which is is really different compared
Speaker 1: to our carnivores where they have the four compartments in
Speaker 1: their stomach. And then horses have a really different GI
Speaker 1: system as well, so different depending on what they eat.
Speaker 1: It can really vary. So we usually try to just
Speaker 1: focus on the main differences. And then you know, muscles
Speaker 1: are all needing the same narrative groups and arteries means
Speaker 1: name the same, so that makes it a little bit easier.
Speaker 1: It can be a challenge though, I'm googgling a lot.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because you learn it once, maybe five years ago,
Speaker 2: and then I totally understand that. I mean that's normal,
Speaker 2: every single person does that. I'm just trying to think
Speaker 2: of doing a necroptcy on a horse, just yeah, just
Speaker 2: how difficult that would that would be. Do you do
Speaker 2: you have specialized morgus for these larger animals? I suppose, Yeah,
Speaker 2: we have.
Speaker 1: Our lab is pretty big, and we have a really
Speaker 1: advanced creaming system that goes through the whole lab, so
Speaker 1: we can lift horses off the ground and move them
Speaker 1: around with the creaming system, which is pretty shocking when
Speaker 1: people haven't seen that before. A whole horse kind of
Speaker 1: floating to the air in our crane rail. So we
Speaker 1: have really large hydraulic tables that fit a horse or
Speaker 1: a cow, or we'll put them actually directly on the
Speaker 1: floor too. So it's quite different, I think than than
Speaker 1: human on autopsy is where you know, we if we
Speaker 1: have ten cases going out once, they can alter in
Speaker 1: our necropsy lab. So we're definitely have some more equipment
Speaker 1: that you probably wouldn't use in autopsies, like a sazzle
Speaker 1: for horse surprise.
Speaker 2: You'd be surprised. I'm sorry, So how Yeah, because I'm wondering, like,
Speaker 2: how do you how do you even lay a horse
Speaker 2: down in the way that you would need to access
Speaker 2: their their chest and abdominal cavity because they don't really
Speaker 2: I guess they have a semi flat back. What do
Speaker 2: you have their head hang off the edge or something.
Speaker 1: Or yeah, so a lot of and some people do
Speaker 1: it differently and I've learned both ways, but we actually
Speaker 1: do most of our autopsy or our necropsies and lateral recumbency,
Speaker 1: so which would be really weird in a human right,
Speaker 1: but yeah, so yes, So we'll only have to take
Speaker 1: off one side of the rib page of a horse,
Speaker 1: uh to to access long and heart, and we'll take
Speaker 1: out a pluck, which I think you probably do a
Speaker 1: humer in medicine too, so tongue tongue delungs, so that
Speaker 1: makes it easier. I have seen different labs do horses
Speaker 1: and dorsal recumbency, which takes just a little bit of
Speaker 1: work to get them to kind of lay flat and
Speaker 1: not roll over. We do like some troughs and different
Speaker 1: tools like that, but we actually, at least at my lab,
Speaker 1: we do decropsies in lateral recumbency in most species, so
Speaker 1: in dogs and cats as well. It's just a little
Speaker 1: bit quicker to just take off on one side of
Speaker 1: the root cage and just encourage the students to learn
Speaker 1: one way that they feel comfortable with and during their
Speaker 1: time with us, and if they do have to end
Speaker 1: up doing any cropsy on their patients in the clinics,
Speaker 1: which they can do, then they'll remember how from what
Speaker 1: we teach them.
Speaker 2: That's cool. So do you take them? Do you take
Speaker 2: all you're saying you take all the organs out in
Speaker 2: one block, or we do We.
Speaker 1: Take at least a tongue to lungs out altogether, and
Speaker 1: then we take the abdomble organs out separately, so we're
Speaker 1: not usually doing just one nice why incision and putting
Speaker 1: them all nicely back in. So it's it's it's quite different,
Speaker 1: at least from from what I know about human autopsy. Yep,
Speaker 1: we take them all out together and then seem for them.
Speaker 2: Imagine those blocks are heavy for you to pull out all.
Speaker 1: It's so heavy a horse imagine you know how long
Speaker 1: a horse horse tongue or horse neck kids, And so
Speaker 1: definitely in teamwork situation when we have those really large animals.
Speaker 1: A few months ago we had a giraffe at my lab,
Speaker 1: so we had you know, like twenty people working on
Speaker 1: the giraffe just because for time and in how heavy
Speaker 1: all the organs were. So it's exciting for us.
Speaker 2: You I was gonna say, were you like so excited
Speaker 2: to go to work that day? I would have been like.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's fun to see species that we don't always see.
Speaker 2: So do you have a particular one that you're like,
Speaker 2: I need to see this before I die.
Speaker 1: I was just talking about this the other day. I'd
Speaker 1: love to see to learn more about the anatomy of
Speaker 1: a platypus, just because they have the venom they have
Speaker 1: like a little venom gland and uh, I I would
Speaker 1: like to I would like to need cropsy a platypus.
Speaker 2: Where are they native to? Oh gosh, I don't even know.
Speaker 2: I wonder if you could just call someone at a
Speaker 2: university there, because they're probably like, oh, we do them
Speaker 2: all the time right now.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I might be able to Yeah, because they're not
Speaker 1: usually you don't usually see them at zoos either, so
Speaker 1: because we do get some animals from zoos and theroughout
Speaker 1: the street, so we do get a lot of different
Speaker 1: species that they aren't Keptain's pets. But I've never seen
Speaker 1: one of those.
Speaker 2: So, yeah, giraffe sounds so cool. I would be I
Speaker 2: would be stoked to see that. I saw a video
Speaker 2: of an autopsy on a whale recently and just think
Speaker 2: like it's just so big and grand. I just don't
Speaker 2: even understand how how you would even navigate that when
Speaker 2: you would have to be standing inside the body to
Speaker 2: try to remove some of the organs. It's just nuts.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've never got to help with that. I'd like to.
Speaker 1: I have some colleagues that like to travel and go
Speaker 1: to Alaska and they've got to help with quite a
Speaker 1: few whale the crumpsis. But I haven't got to do that.
Speaker 1: But it would be fun and smell.
Speaker 2: So I know, I thought about that, like, Okay, you
Speaker 2: have this large animal that's dying and decomposing in a
Speaker 2: bottle of body of water. It's probably the worst smell ever.
Speaker 2: They smell terrible when they're alive, right.
Speaker 1: Like, yeah, I've heard it's pretty bad.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I can't. I can't even imagine, because a human
Speaker 2: that's in a body of water that's dead is terrible.
Speaker 2: So I just can't. I can't even wrap my brain
Speaker 2: around it. But I always say, like, the science of
Speaker 2: it is so exciting that you just kind of ignore
Speaker 2: the horrible smell because you want to see something cool,
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think so. Yeah, I'm not really affected by
Speaker 1: it anymore, but are students that aren't always down there
Speaker 1: definitely have like the vics under their nose, And.
Speaker 2: I love that I love when students come in and
Speaker 2: just have no idea what they're about to walk into,
Speaker 2: and some of them are just like, look like they're
Speaker 2: going to throw up in the corner, and you just
Speaker 2: think you better get used to this because this is
Speaker 2: what you're going to smell every day working here.
Speaker 1: Yep.
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Speaker 2: When So, when you get these, you get a lot
Speaker 2: of specimens on animals and stuff. Is there a common
Speaker 2: tumor that used the most common benign tumor most common
Speaker 2: malignant tumors that you see in animals?
Speaker 1: Oh? Geez. At least so there's definitely a difference in
Speaker 1: kind of the types of cases that we see. So
Speaker 1: here we are at Colorado, we see a lot of theoplasia.
Speaker 1: So we have a big animal cancer center in the
Speaker 1: teaching hospital, so a lot of the cases that we
Speaker 1: do get are neoplasia. But I did residency in the Southeast,
Speaker 1: so we had a lot more infextious cases come through
Speaker 1: surgical biopsy and necropsy. I'd say probably I thought of
Speaker 1: this when we were talking about your your friend's dog
Speaker 1: that passed. But we do see a lot of famagiosarcola
Speaker 1: as far as malignant cancer goes. So that's a tumor
Speaker 1: of the endothelial lining of vessels, so the cells align
Speaker 1: blood vessels, and they're really common in the spleen. So
Speaker 1: we do get those cases really commonly where the fleet
Speaker 1: is ruptured and they have a female abdomen blood and
Speaker 1: the abdomen, so that's an unfortunate one. They do happen
Speaker 1: in the skin as well, and can be animals can
Speaker 1: be predisposed from increased sun exposure. Use the exposure, so
Speaker 1: in Colorado, where it's really sunny and we're at a
Speaker 1: higher elevation, we see a lot of those in the skin.
Speaker 1: And then as far as benign. You know, we get
Speaker 1: a lot of hammer tolas, little gingeble mass that are
Speaker 1: just hyper plastic that are benign, just proliferations. I think
Speaker 1: that's pretty common. I mentioned I really like dirm paths,
Speaker 1: so I get a lot of allergy itchy dog skin
Speaker 1: biopsies that are technically benign but cause the pent discomfort.
Speaker 2: Can animals. So this might this might be a stupid question,
Speaker 2: but I've been very allergic to dogs my entire life.
Speaker 2: I get asthma in if they lick me, I get hives,
Speaker 2: and just I can't be around them. Can animals have
Speaker 2: that towards humans? Is there is Has that ever been documented?
Speaker 1: You know, it's I think it would be hard to prove.
Speaker 1: We do. Clinicians, dermatologists will do allergy testing and dogs,
Speaker 1: kind of like like we do for people where you
Speaker 1: get all the little pig Yeah. Yeah, So we can't
Speaker 1: do that in dogs. But it's a little bit the
Speaker 1: science is a little bit less clear than in humans.
Speaker 1: So I haven't heard of a case where, you know,
Speaker 1: human deander human skins came up as an allergen to dogs,
Speaker 1: but they do have pretty similar environmental allergens that people do.
Speaker 1: The grasses and so seasonal allergies dogs get pretty commonly.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's I mean, it's possible, right, Like, it's definitely possible.
Speaker 2: I just never really thought about that when you have
Speaker 2: so you're talking you have a cancer center. What I
Speaker 2: feel like, I only know a couple of people that
Speaker 2: have had cancer and how to get chemo, one being
Speaker 2: my grandmom and my and my uncle both had billiary cancer,
Speaker 2: so they had terrible, like hardcore chemo. And I wouldn't
Speaker 2: really advise that for any human, let alone an animal.
Speaker 2: And I know people talk about getting their animals chemotherapy,
Speaker 2: so and then some vetecs that are in the grosser room,
Speaker 2: I've mentioned that it's just not as the same as
Speaker 2: a human getting it. So can you explain that to
Speaker 2: us more?
Speaker 1: Yeah? So, I mean, at least where I work, a
Speaker 1: lot of animals are getting chemotherapy, right since they travel
Speaker 1: here to get treatment from our own cologists. And from
Speaker 1: what I understand is often the dosages of the chemotherapeutics
Speaker 1: aren't as strong as what we give people, so they
Speaker 1: might not get as severe side effects. And I mean
Speaker 1: we do see dogs. They're nounxious, a little bit inappetent,
Speaker 1: maybe self hair loss, but it's never as severe as
Speaker 1: it seems that people experience, and so we can treat
Speaker 1: again with anti nauga and medications and they seem to
Speaker 1: do really well. And I don't think it's you know,
Speaker 1: as understood, but I think it has to do with
Speaker 1: the dosage of what chemotherapeutic they're using. We do have animals.
Speaker 1: I've seen some animals that just don't respond well or
Speaker 1: have such severe side effects that that they have to discontinue.
Speaker 1: So it does happen, but not as not as commonly
Speaker 1: as in people.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So do you ever think maybe humans could get
Speaker 2: a little bit less and they don't know so.
Speaker 1: Much or something. And I think, yeah, there's a there's
Speaker 1: a difference, right, Like we're and obviously in the animals too,
Speaker 1: or trying for curative intent with chemotherapy. But uh, you know,
Speaker 1: a lot of a lot of the neoplasia and the
Speaker 1: cancer that dogs are getting, maybe chemotherapy extend their life
Speaker 1: by one cancer for a year. That's like pretty hopeful
Speaker 1: for a lot of diseases, unfortunately, but people were hoping
Speaker 1: for like complete remission and for life exactly. So I
Speaker 1: think that that has a lot to do with it
Speaker 1: as well, just kind of different, different therapeutic goals I
Speaker 1: guess for for dogs ors people.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I understand them. Yeah, So talk talking about my
Speaker 2: same friend. Hopefully she listens to this. I'll tell her
Speaker 2: to anyway. Which So she has dogs that she gets
Speaker 2: from a breeder, and I feel like they have they
Speaker 2: have problems.
Speaker 1: I don't.
Speaker 2: I don't have dogs, so I don't know if every
Speaker 2: dog just has problems. But she's had autoimmune disease. A
Speaker 2: couple have had cancer and die at eight nine years old,
Speaker 2: not too old, but I don't know again how long
Speaker 2: they're supposed to live. But she so I always say
Speaker 2: to her, like, maybe you don't want to get this
Speaker 2: from the breeder, because I did write an article last
Speaker 2: year in the gross room about inbreeding with humans, and
Speaker 2: I couldn't really get I did find a couple of
Speaker 2: articles talking about it with animals, but there was some
Speaker 2: conflicting information with that. So I know, with humans, if
Speaker 2: you have children too close together, there could be an
Speaker 2: increased risk of genetic mutations and inherited genetic other inherited
Speaker 2: genetic diseases. What about with animals? You have been aion
Speaker 2: on that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you know what some of This has been
Speaker 1: pretty well proven with different breeds of dogs, and we'll
Speaker 1: just use dogs as an examples since that's the most common.
Speaker 1: But certain diseases, Yes, it's been proven. We've found the
Speaker 1: genetic mutation in certain breeds that predisposed to different cancers
Speaker 1: and different conditions. In other times, we haven't been able
Speaker 1: to sign that that genetic but it seems like there
Speaker 1: is a predisposition. A higher percentage of say Golden Retrievers
Speaker 1: get osteosarcola and Mandia sarcoma. These are all just examples.
Speaker 1: Burne's Mountain dogs get histiocidic diseases histiocidic circla. Most of
Speaker 1: them get this some some sort of histiocidic neoplasm during
Speaker 1: their life. So I think it's it's proven that that
Speaker 1: certain pure bred dogs are predisposed to certain diseases. But
Speaker 1: that being said, because I get this question all the time, like,
Speaker 1: well I got a I got a mutt from the
Speaker 1: pound and it still got bone cancer, and like why
Speaker 1: did that happen? And now there's still spontaneous point mutations
Speaker 1: that are you know, predisposed to to neoplasia. So I
Speaker 1: think we just don't know as much in dogs as
Speaker 1: we do and people about about genetic predispositions or genetic mutations,
Speaker 1: but we're getting there slowly through research and identifying these genes.
Speaker 1: So you know, I have all mixed breed dogs partly
Speaker 1: for that reason. But you know, it doesn't doesn't stop
Speaker 1: doesn't stop folks that love a certain breed from continuing
Speaker 1: to to get them. So I think it's important to
Speaker 1: you know, look into what breeder you're buying dogs from
Speaker 1: and seeing if they're on top of research, because there
Speaker 1: are a lot of tests that you can do, a
Speaker 1: test for genetic mutations and breeds that we know about
Speaker 1: kind of and stop breeding those individuals. So I think,
Speaker 1: if you're gonna buy pure bread dogs, make sure you're
Speaker 1: buying some responsible breeders and not just you know, hobby
Speaker 1: backyard people.
Speaker 2: That just made me think of something too, when you
Speaker 2: were saying that people were saying that their MutS were
Speaker 2: coming up with bone cancer or something too. I mean,
Speaker 2: I'm assuming that animals have that can have the same
Speaker 2: environmental exposures to viruses and even I mean what I've
Speaker 2: never thought about this either, but what about a dog
Speaker 2: living in a house with with a chronic smoker or
Speaker 2: something like that. Has there only been studies done on
Speaker 2: that kind of stuff?
Speaker 1: There has been. It's again pretty difficult to prove. But
Speaker 1: you know we I get that question all the time too,
Speaker 1: Like I lived near sanctuaries, that's why my dog died? Maybe, right,
Speaker 1: We can't really say one way or the other. They've
Speaker 1: done big studies on swain A cell carsonoma and cats
Speaker 1: that thought maybe like cats that were in smoking households
Speaker 1: were more likely to get carconoma. But it's just it's
Speaker 1: hard to hard to prove. And think about, you know,
Speaker 1: an animal that has such a shortened life span compared
Speaker 1: to a person, so their environmental exposures can have a
Speaker 1: greater impact in their lifetime, or at least that's kind
Speaker 1: of what we think. And you know, it's easier to
Speaker 1: study cancers and dogs because they have a shorter life
Speaker 1: span compared to a person. Right, So for example, on
Speaker 1: going back to the pure bread dogs were part of
Speaker 1: a Golden retriever lifetime study from the Morris Animal Foundation.
Speaker 1: So they've followed around two thousand dogs Golden retrievers from
Speaker 1: tying their puppy to death and they get regular veterinary
Speaker 1: care and they'll all or as many as we can
Speaker 1: get the cropsies at the end of their life to
Speaker 1: try to get a little bit more information on what
Speaker 1: these dogs are dying from and do some more genetic research.
Speaker 1: So I think with time, when we're trying to catch
Speaker 1: up to human medicine, we'll figure more of that stuff out.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's just this is just so cool. I really
Speaker 2: appreciate this interview with you because I'm learning so much
Speaker 2: stuff today. So there's we're going to start turn talking
Speaker 2: about now how your work could also help humans. There's
Speaker 2: infectious diseases for those of you who don't know that
Speaker 2: are listening that some can are specific to species, like
Speaker 2: feline HIV or HIV, and felines are Feline immuno deficiency
Speaker 2: virus is only something that happens in felines, and human
Speaker 2: immune deficiency virus is only something that happens in humans,
Speaker 2: So a human that has that just can't give it
Speaker 2: to a cat. But there are ones that are called
Speaker 2: zoonotic diseases which cross species. And I know that most
Speaker 2: people could say that they've heard of that because of
Speaker 2: when they were talking about the origin of COVID, when
Speaker 2: they were trying to determine if it was coming from
Speaker 2: one of those wet markets and that they were saying
Speaker 2: that it crossed species from an animal to a human.
Speaker 2: So in those types of cases, someone like you would
Speaker 2: get involved in that kind of stuff. Is have you
Speaker 2: ever been involved in a case where you were doing
Speaker 2: a necropsy on an animal to try to see if
Speaker 2: it was from if it was spreading to humans or
Speaker 2: vice versa.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we get zoonotic cases pretty frequently. The biggest example
Speaker 1: is ravies, So our lab removes breeds and then the
Speaker 1: virology lave upstairs will do the fluorescent antibody tests to
Speaker 1: determine if an animal had bravies or not. So I
Speaker 1: think that's probably the best example where we get. My
Speaker 1: tech texted me the other day and we had we
Speaker 1: got fifty cases in one day where a brain brains
Speaker 1: needed to be removed from wildlife and dogs. So we
Speaker 1: get mostly the dog cases are from bite bite cases
Speaker 1: where the dogs weren't vaccinated against rabies and then they
Speaker 1: bit someone and so they were euthanized and had to
Speaker 1: have their brain removed for to test for rabies to
Speaker 1: make sure the person wasn't exposed. So we get those
Speaker 1: all the time, we do get some positives, but by
Speaker 1: that time, hopefully the person who's had post exposure vaccinations.
Speaker 1: I haven't had one where since. Like we're using rabies
Speaker 1: as an example, it's so rare for humans in the
Speaker 1: US to succumb to riebies get disease from it, so
Speaker 1: I haven't had to go backwards in that way. But
Speaker 1: we do a lot of zoonotic testing in our lab,
Speaker 1: so we get wildlife and even dogs and cats where
Speaker 1: plague is suspected or tularemia. Those are big examples that
Speaker 1: are common in Colorado. We've had a couple of anthrax cases.
Speaker 1: We had one two years ago in the lab, which
Speaker 1: is scary. Luckily, we have our a separate kind of
Speaker 1: area for zoanautic diseases, so only one person was around
Speaker 1: the cow that had it to do the testing. But
Speaker 1: that's a big deal that we have to, you know,
Speaker 1: afford the government about reportable diseases. Yeah, so we we
Speaker 1: do that a lot. What usually happens if an animal
Speaker 1: has plague, and especially a dog, this happens every couple
Speaker 1: of years where it was treated in the hospital, so
Speaker 1: vet students and nurses and doctors were all exposed in
Speaker 1: this dog and that. Yeah, so so that's usually where
Speaker 1: kind of at least they don't have the disease, but
Speaker 1: they were exposed. So we want to make sure people
Speaker 1: are aware of that. We get chlamydia cases that are zonautic,
Speaker 1: so we have, you know, a biosecurity hood that we
Speaker 1: do all our pet birds in and certain abortion cases,
Speaker 1: so for cue fever and chlamydia. So we're exposed to
Speaker 1: quite a few different zonotic things on the necropsy floor.
Speaker 2: Were so I I don't know if you listen to
Speaker 2: my interview that I did with doctor Michelle Miranda, she's
Speaker 2: a forensic tattoo expert and she was They did listen
Speaker 2: to that one, Yeah, did you so just briefly like
Speaker 2: she was talking about she had just been been at
Speaker 2: a conference in Australia and found out that koalas carried chlamydia.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they do. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Is that something that is considered zoonautically? Could it get
Speaker 2: spread to humans or it's a different kind of.
Speaker 1: I think that one's different. It's Chlamydia cacorum. I can't
Speaker 1: remember if humans can get that one, but the ones
Speaker 1: that birds get is citicize, so for media citizize, So
Speaker 1: our citizen prayerents. So here is like cockatiles, all of
Speaker 1: them and we can get that from media. So oh god.
Speaker 1: But yeah, so we uh you know, that's a reason
Speaker 1: why we do all those cases in the biosecurity hood,
Speaker 1: even if we're I'm pretty sure that's not what it is,
Speaker 1: just in case. So since we're working with students a lot,
Speaker 1: you don't want that. Uh oh, well went of you know,
Speaker 1: opening out to the animal and seeing that it's probably
Speaker 1: something zoonotic.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we had one time. I used to work at
Speaker 2: a hospital that did a lot of neuropathology and we
Speaker 2: had a case of suspected rabies and they wanted us
Speaker 2: to do the autopsy in our lab. And I remember
Speaker 2: the neuropathologist came up to me and he was like,
Speaker 2: I just don't want you do in that case. And
Speaker 2: I was like, okay, he's just like, you don't want
Speaker 2: to be exposed to that. I don't know what the
Speaker 2: precautions are here, just it would be better if you're
Speaker 2: not exposed to it. So do you do you guys
Speaker 2: have to do special precautions for suspected cases of rabies
Speaker 2: or is that just normal universal precautions.
Speaker 1: We're actually all vaccinated, So all of that students and
Speaker 1: anyone that works in our lab is that's going to
Speaker 1: be around breeding tissues vaccinated against rabies. And then we
Speaker 1: do tires that our work pays for every other year
Speaker 1: to just make sure that we're good to go. But
Speaker 1: we do we don't expose the students even though they're vaccinated,
Speaker 1: So we have a separate area that we'll remove brains
Speaker 1: and then usually my technicians are doing that, so they
Speaker 1: wear cut gloves and take a little bit extra precautions.
Speaker 1: Definitely not using any saus around potential rabies suspects. But
Speaker 1: we do have you know, in ninety fives and we
Speaker 1: get fit tested and we try to be as careful
Speaker 1: as we can with those cases.
Speaker 2: It's mandatory then that you guys give vaccinate for that
Speaker 2: because I would I would think it should be yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: we're not for.
Speaker 1: Humans, that's right, right, So if we had a medical reason.
Speaker 1: I've had a couple of that students that got really
Speaker 1: had really severe reactions. It's a three vaccine series, so
Speaker 1: maybe they end up only getting two and then getting
Speaker 1: tighters more regularly, but otherwise were all required to do
Speaker 1: that and do the by or every other year tighter.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because the it's it's not like, oh, I'll take
Speaker 2: my chances. You're you're going to die if you get that,
Speaker 2: so I would definitely.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So all veterinarians are vaccinated just because they're gonna
Speaker 1: get they're probably at maybe a higher risk just because
Speaker 1: they can get bit.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Right, but.
Speaker 2: Oh god, that's scary. All right, let's talk about the
Speaker 2: forensic aspect of this. I don't know how familiar you
Speaker 2: are with it, but in the Grosser Room last week
Speaker 2: or two weeks ago, I wrote about a k of
Speaker 2: a dog. So the scene investigators show up to the
Speaker 2: scene of a murder where a man was shot and
Speaker 2: also his dog was shot to death. They were both
Speaker 2: shot to death, and they said that one of the
Speaker 2: one of the man went to the medical examiner to
Speaker 2: get an autopsy, but then the dog had a necropsy
Speaker 2: done to retrieve a bullet. So that got me really
Speaker 2: thinking about talking to someone like you, because this is
Speaker 2: this is really interesting. Obviously, the body of the human
Speaker 2: will go to the medical examiner's office, would the body
Speaker 2: of the dog go to someone like you?
Speaker 1: Yes, yep. We get forensic or legal necropsy cases all
Speaker 1: the time. We had two. I had two yesterday. So
Speaker 1: we get cases submitted from all different counties of law
Speaker 1: enforcement agencies or humane societies throughout Colorado. And then we
Speaker 1: also mentioned that pet owners can submit, so they can
Speaker 1: choose to submit their own themal for a forensic the
Speaker 1: propsy and with plans to you know, prosecute or try
Speaker 1: to try to prosecute whoever they think might have killed
Speaker 1: their animal or so we do get cases like that too.
Speaker 2: That's that's really interesting. So when you learned this in school,
Speaker 2: you learned this in your in your residency thing that
Speaker 2: you were doing afterwards. So during that were you trained
Speaker 2: specifically in forensics how to handle evidence and how to
Speaker 2: take pictures because ultimately these case that information could be
Speaker 2: used in the prosecution with the case probably I'm assuming yep.
Speaker 1: So we handle them a little bit differently. Uh, And
Speaker 1: I've you know, I have an interest in forensics, so
Speaker 1: I've I definitely seek out additional continuing education or training
Speaker 1: at our different pathology meetings, there's often different lectures or
Speaker 1: workshops that we can do about forensics. So we do
Speaker 1: take photos differently than we do of our other cases
Speaker 1: with labels and not deleting photos that we take, making
Speaker 1: sure we're documenting every single part, which we don't always
Speaker 1: do with our diagnostic regular cases, and then collecting evidence
Speaker 1: a different way. We store tissues for much longer than
Speaker 1: we do our normal cases for years, collect them in
Speaker 1: a little bit different way for forensic cases. But I
Speaker 1: know training can vary quite a bit amongst training programs.
Speaker 1: One thing that I try to expose our residents to
Speaker 1: these cases because we make sure that the residents don't
Speaker 1: take kind of primary responsibility for legal cases because we
Speaker 1: don't want them to get subpoenat and have to go
Speaker 1: to court for it. They may have moved away or
Speaker 1: be busy with studying or some things we don't want
Speaker 1: them to have to deal with it. But I think
Speaker 1: that kind of does a disservice for our residents because
Speaker 1: then when they start a job and they're all of
Speaker 1: a sudden like, okay, here you going, Now you're the
Speaker 1: responsible party. So I try to at least talk to
Speaker 1: them about the cases that I take and make sure
Speaker 1: they're aware the process so that it's not a surprise
Speaker 1: when they're done with residency.
Speaker 2: Yeah that makes sense, because yeah, they'll be getting ready
Speaker 2: to take a really important test and have to go
Speaker 2: testify at court and just exactly that would be the
Speaker 2: last thing on their mind that they want to deal
Speaker 2: with at that point. So there's been times where you
Speaker 2: will collect like bullets, do you collect DNA and stuff
Speaker 2: like that too.
Speaker 1: We will collect at least fresh sterile tissue, but and
Speaker 1: I know, you know, other labs are a little bit
Speaker 1: better equipped to collect trace evidence and you know, fingerprint
Speaker 1: the animals and DNA, but we do rely on our
Speaker 1: law enforcement agency to do some of that before they
Speaker 1: bring the animal to us. But I'll just try to
Speaker 1: collect as much as I then, and you know, we're
Speaker 1: not ballistics experts, so we'd still rely on the law
Speaker 1: enforcement officer that is assigned to the case to come
Speaker 1: and pick up the bullet fragments to do additional testing there.
Speaker 1: But we try to collect as much as possible at
Speaker 1: the time of the exam that we might need later on.
Speaker 1: So we'll keep stomach contents and additional samples fluids that
Speaker 1: we might not for a normal ne cropsy, but try
Speaker 1: to just to anticipate anything that we might have to
Speaker 1: do later on.
Speaker 2: What are other circumstances that you would do a forensic
Speaker 2: exam on an animal so.
Speaker 1: We get the We get a lot of unfortunately, a
Speaker 1: lot of neglect and abuse cases, so hoarding cases where
Speaker 1: animal controls called out because you know, they see their
Speaker 1: neighbors starving their dog and it died, so they want
Speaker 1: to prove that and try to prosecute the person that
Speaker 1: they think killed the animal from neglect or abuse. So
Speaker 1: that's probably most common. And then you know, we get unfortunately,
Speaker 1: we get cases like the one that you mentioned where
Speaker 1: a person was injured at the same time, so they
Speaker 1: want to try to use that to help in prosecution
Speaker 1: against the injury that they did towards a person or
Speaker 1: if they murdered them. You know, we've had a case
Speaker 1: where person you know, attempted to they killed the animal,
Speaker 1: They killed the dog, and then tried to kill their
Speaker 1: girlfriend the same time. So they really want to hammer
Speaker 1: at home and use that in the prosecution to make
Speaker 1: sure that person goes to prison. Yeah, if they we
Speaker 1: get a lot of you know, starvation cases. Unfortunately, they're
Speaker 1: abandoned buildings and they find an animal in there, so
Speaker 1: they want to see if it was killed or if
Speaker 1: it died of natural causes.
Speaker 2: Yeah, my husband works in Camden City. I don't know
Speaker 2: if you know anything about it. But he sees a
Speaker 2: lot of he's a firefighter and he just comes across
Speaker 2: cases of different things all the time, and I think
Speaker 2: about all of these. There's I guess there's special police
Speaker 2: officers like animal control officers, so you must deal with
Speaker 2: them when you're dealing with this, right, And would you
Speaker 2: or have you ever had to go to court to
Speaker 2: testify on any of these types of cases?
Speaker 1: So so far I haven't gone to court, but I
Speaker 1: do get subpoena like multiple times a year, and you know,
Speaker 1: I've gotten to where the trial was the next week
Speaker 1: and that, but then the person pled guilty, so I'm
Speaker 1: almost had to go to trial. And multiple times I
Speaker 1: have kind of an active case right now that they
Speaker 1: think is going to go to trial later in the summer.
Speaker 1: But my colleagues have multiple times, some of them so
Speaker 1: over their career years. So we do get called as
Speaker 1: expert witnesses for these cases. A lot of times they're
Speaker 1: able to just use our report to prosecute, but other
Speaker 1: times they really feel like it would be important for
Speaker 1: us to to go to trial, So we do get
Speaker 1: called a lot. So I may go to trial later
Speaker 1: this year, but often as soon as they put us
Speaker 1: in as expert witnesses, I feel like they kind of
Speaker 1: do a plea deal. Or at least that's been my experience.
Speaker 1: But yeah, at least like three or four of my
Speaker 1: of the other pathologists I work with, have had to
Speaker 1: go multiple times for different cases.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that would make me so nervous. I mean, I
Speaker 2: guess I don't know, because I feel like when I
Speaker 2: do autopsy and stuff, I'm very confident in what I find.
Speaker 2: And I think I would be I would be fine.
Speaker 2: I just I've been to court a couple times with
Speaker 2: the medical examiner and the defense lawyers are just so
Speaker 2: like scummy and ask these stupid questions, and I would
Speaker 2: I don't know how I would. I wouldn't be I
Speaker 2: would be like a smart ass to them.
Speaker 1: Maybe yeah, I one of the cases. I you know,
Speaker 1: when I first started, I wasn't really sure how the
Speaker 1: process worked, and I didn't know that you could say
Speaker 1: no to the defense about meeting beforehand. So they wanted
Speaker 1: to meet before the trial, and it was a video
Speaker 1: chat and it was an hour long interrogation from them
Speaker 1: like how can you say this? Like what if this
Speaker 1: was your animal? And how old do you think this
Speaker 1: dog should have lived and just oh my god, it
Speaker 1: was a lot. So I was happy that that one
Speaker 1: didn't go all the way because it did give me
Speaker 1: a taste of what it could could be like. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I think, you know, whatever case we're doing, we should
Speaker 1: have considents in what we put out in our report,
Speaker 1: so as long as we can stick to that, But
Speaker 1: you know, they do, they do want us to give
Speaker 1: our opinions as well, like not based on our findings,
Speaker 1: which I really try to avoid. Uh, you know, just
Speaker 1: like I can only tell you what I see in
Speaker 1: my exam, and they have a lot more information about
Speaker 1: the case than we do to kind of make those inferences.
Speaker 1: And it's up to the officers and the prosecution to
Speaker 1: put the story together.
Speaker 2: So yeah, And isn't it like the court might be
Speaker 2: a whole year or later after you actually did the case.
Speaker 2: So you're like, I don't I don't remember read my report.
Speaker 2: This is what I saw.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they they'll email me and say, hey, you're gonna
Speaker 1: get a subpoena from and they just give you the
Speaker 1: animal's name maybe or like I'm like, I have no
Speaker 1: idea what case that is. I'm going to need a
Speaker 1: date range or something.
Speaker 2: Right, You're like, I've done fifty this week, Like what
Speaker 2: do you what do you want from me here?
Speaker 1: All right?
Speaker 2: Well, do you have anything else that that you want
Speaker 2: to talk about that I didn't cover?
Speaker 1: Oh? I just saying, you know, for anyone that then
Speaker 1: is thinking about, you know, going into veterinary medicine, just
Speaker 1: keep all your options open. Can do a lot with
Speaker 1: this degree or even any science degree like you mentioned.
Speaker 1: You know, look what's out there. There's a lot of
Speaker 1: careers that you might not have heard of. I think
Speaker 1: most people that I tell what my job is, they've
Speaker 1: never they don't know what pathology is, or didn't know
Speaker 1: that there are venternoring pathologists to any propsy. So just
Speaker 1: to do your research and keep keep your auctions open, uh,
Speaker 1: for what you want to end up doing.
Speaker 2: I love that this is this is so interesting and
Speaker 2: I think what I gather from this whole interview is
Speaker 2: that your job is so cool and at any level
Speaker 2: if you just if you want to be a tech
Speaker 2: so I guess if you went to there's like a
Speaker 2: degree for associate's degree for vet tech. Right, it's associates, yes, man,
Speaker 2: Or if you want to go the full route and
Speaker 2: do the whole doctor. If you want to be a
Speaker 2: doctor too, there's a different there's lots of different education
Speaker 2: levels that you could do this job. And on top
Speaker 2: of that, it's cool because I feel like in human
Speaker 2: medicine you have to pick like, Okay, do you want
Speaker 2: to do hospital pathology or forensic pathology, And with yours,
Speaker 2: it's like you can kind of do everything and see
Speaker 2: lots more. Honestly, it sounds really interesting.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, I think it's best job ever.
Speaker 2: So you've definitely sold me. I'm very interested in Thank
Speaker 2: you well, thanks for being here with us today. It
Speaker 2: was so nice meeting.
Speaker 1: You, nice, feeding you to you.
Speaker 2: Thanks, thank you for listening to Mother nos Death. As
Speaker 2: a reminder, my training is as a pathologists assistant. I
Speaker 2: have a master's level education and specialize in anatomy and
Speaker 2: pathology education. I am not a doctor and I have
Speaker 2: not diagnosed or treated anyone dead or alive without the
Speaker 2: assistance of a licensed medical doctor. This show, my website,
Speaker 2: and social media accounts are designed to educate and inform
Speaker 2: people based on my experience working in pathology, so they
Speaker 2: can make healthier decisions regarding their life and well being.
Speaker 2: Always remember that science is changing. Every day, and the
Speaker 2: opinions expressed in this episode are based on my knowledge
Speaker 2: of those subjects at the time of publication. If you
Speaker 2: are having a medical problem, have a medical question, or
Speaker 2: having a medical emergency, please contact your physician or visit
Speaker 2: an urgent care center, emergency room, or hospital. Please rate, review,
Speaker 2: and subscribe to Mother Knows Death on Apple, Spotify, YouTube,
Speaker 2: or anywhere you get podcasts. Thanks