Special circumstances require a special solution.

Animal Dental Clinic: mobile-home — Animal Dental Clinic has the portable equipment and expertise needed to handle any dentistry and oral surgery situation.

A ready-to-go mobile unit is available for situations where travelling is not in the best medical interest of the animal in need. These scenarios include severe trauma, where transportation from the intensive care unit may be detrimental, and captive exotic or wild animals that require dental and oral expertise.

For Critical Care Patients

Animal Dental Clinic can accommodate patients who can’t leave the ICU. For some critical patients that require major reconstructive surgery, the attending veterinarian and our specialist in veterinary dentistry and oral surgery may decide that is in the best interest of the patient to perform the procedure at the patient’s location.

To serve those patients, Animal Dental Clinic has developed a mobile dentistry and oral surgical service. We partner with hospitals throughout the San Francisco Bay Area to bring our advanced equipment and expertise to the facility that best meets the needs of our most critical patients.

Animal Dental Clinic: critical-care — Animal Dental Clinic can provide oral surgical services for patients who need an intensive care unit, advanced imaging, or other facilities by coordinating with partner hospitals.

For Zoos And Wildlife Sanctuaries

Captive wildlife are at risk for the same oral diseases as their wild counterparts, as well as having some additional considerations related to their captivity. The inability to bring them to our facility for treatment shouldn’t mean that they have to live with their oral disease, so Animal Dental Clinic has developed the capability to assist with expertise and equipment to treat the oral disease of captive wildlife in the field.

Animal Dental Clinic: mobile-zoo — Dr. Farcas was part of a team of experts performing root canal treatments on tigers at the Performing Animal Welfare Society (PAWS) facility in San Andreas, CA.

Animal Dental Clinic’s San Carlos facility is the best place for us to perform routine and advanced procedures for dogs and cats, but occasionally, we work with colleagues who provide care to other species in need of dentistry and oral surgery expertise. Here is a bit more detail on a few of those collaborations.

Beak Repair on a Macaw

Dr. Farcas used a model to plan an approach to stabilize the fractured mandible to allow for healing. He applied a titanium mesh and external fixation apparatus to the bird’s mandible.

Animal Dental Clinic: Bird-model — Macaw skull model demonstrating application of a titanium mesh for fracture stabilization (left) and a titanium external fixation apparatus (right).

Animal Dental Clinic: Bird-CT-post — Post-operative CT image of the macaw’s fractured mandible with the titanium mesh and external fixation apparatus in place.

Root Canal Treatments on a Rescued Tiger

PAWS staff described the process beautifully in their April 2018 newsletter

Animal Dental Clinic: Tiger-Local — Dr. Farcas administers a local anesthetic drug as a part of the tiger’s anesthetic management. This allows for use of less general anesthetic drugs as well as prolonged post-operative pain control.

Animal Dental Clinic: Tiger-File — Dr. Farcas uses specialized files (made for root canal treatment of large carnivores) to remove the painful damaged nerve and blood vessels of the fractured tooth’s pulp.

Animal Dental Clinic: Tiger-Rad — Dental radiograph of the tiger’s tooth demonstrating that the root canal has been completely filled with a biocompatible material that replaces the damaged tooth’s pulp.

We might add that in patients (of all species) with relatively recent fractures, pulpitis is anticipated, which means that a two-stage root canal procedure is likely more beneficial to provide immediate pain relief while minimizing total anesthetic time. In many patients with older fractures, pulp necrosis has already occurred, and the root canal procedure can be completed in a single anesthetic episode.