Photo: Sarah-Ann Lee
Craig MacLellan
Europe’s most advanced animal hospital has opened its doors at Glasgow University’s Garscube Campus in Bearsden.
The new £15 million institute, which has taken ten years of planning, is expected to have over 11,000 visits annually.
The centre will provide a new benchmark for the care of animals with a vast range of services offered, including a diagnostic suite complete with both MRI and CT scanners, a centre for comparative oncology, a modern operating theatre equipped with cameras to allow the remote viewing of procedures, an underwater treadmill and a pain and rehabilitation centre.
Professor Stuart Reid, Dean of the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine believes the new hospital will herald massive step forward in the treatment of animals.
He said: “The opening of the new hospital is a step-change in the treatment of small animals. It represents the latest in care for pets and is the most advanced such facility in Europe. The patients we treat will still receive the best care available, but this will now be in the best surroundings available.”
The centre will also play an important role as a training hospital, where approximately 120 veterinary students and 30 veterinary nursing students will shadow specialists trained in all aspects of veterinary medicine.
Professor Stuart Reid said: “The new hospital will allow the vets of tomorrow to learn in the most advanced surroundings, allying the first-class building with access to the some of the best specialist vets in their field. As a training aid, it is unsurpassed.
“With cutting edge facilities and capacity for training veterinarians at all stages of their career, the Faculty will be using the building as a flagship for its clinical provision.”
The hospital also houses a state of the art endoscopy room, containing the most up to date endoscope, allowing visualisation of early cancerous changes in the guts of both dogs and cats.
Dr Mark Jackson, the Director of the new Small Animal Hospital, explained that the hospital is seeing an increasing number of cancer referrals and that the new centre will assist in their treatment and understanding of the disease.
He said: “Our centre for comparative oncology gives a wide range of treatment for most types of cancers in small animals.
“As well as allowing us to treat these conditions, the new facilities will allow us to gain a better understanding about the development of illnesses and produce new ways to both diagnose and treat them.”
