USER CASE Dr. J. Phillip Pickett is a professor of ophthalmology in the Department of Small Animal Clinical Sciences at the Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine at Virginia Tech and board certified by the American College of Veterinary Ophthalmologists. His clinical and research interests include genetic eye disease, glaucoma, equine corneal disease and equine uveitis. CHOSEN BY HIS PROFESSION Animals have always been an important part of Dr. Pickett’s life. Even today, full time professional work with animals has not stopped him having two dogs, three cats, and four chickens as pets. At 8 years of age, little Phil Pickett came across his first patient case in veterinary ophthalmology. As a child, he raised box turtles in the summertime. One of them had badly infect- ed eyes and appeared to be blind. The boy was so upset over this, that his mother – a nurse by profession – gave him some ophthalmic ointment to treat the turtle’s eyes. Sure enough, in a couple of weeks one eye cleared and the turtle regained its vision. The decision to become a veterinarian took form in his 9th grade civics class, when all the kids had to pick a career that interested them and research it for a class presentation. “I never swayed from that junior high school decision”, says Pickett. TUTORED BY GREAT TEACHERS In undergraduate school Phil Pickett worked one summer at the University of Arkansas Medical School with a lab animal veterinarian who did research work in cryosurgery. Those months were spent freezing “cancer eye” cows, skin tumors, etc. Somewhere during that summer the devoted student read all the texts on ocular anatomy and physiology he could get his hands on. “It was great”, he says. As a first year vet student, he was lucky to have an anatomy professor, Dr. Y. Z. Abdelbaki, who was very interested in the eye and certainly contributed to the young man’s choice of focus. After graduation he worked in a rural, general practice in Arkansas for 3 years. Classmates and other local veterinarians who knew he enjoyed eye cases, would send him theirs, since the drive to the closest ophthalmologist would take about 7 hours. All this finally led to the decision to pursue residency train- ing. Pickett obtained a position at the University of Wisconsin under Dr. Cecil Moore. There was no turning back from a career that was already half passion, half profession. ALWAYS MOVED BY HIS PATIENTS Most of Dr. Pickett’s patients are dogs, cats and horses - in this order of numbers - but there are always some exotics, small ruminants, and occasionally cattle. The species most typically predisposed to glaucoma is most definitely the canine spe- cies. Dogs have primary glaucoma as well as all the different secondary glaucoma types, while other species generally have just the secondary glaucomas. According to Dr. Pickett, the biggest challenges in treating glaucoma are: - An adequate, dependable measurement of IOP to initially diagnose the disease. - A coherent follow up on the success of therapy. Too often the referring veterinarians have no means of measuring the pressure accurately. Because of that, the cases will go undiagnosed for too long to be able to salvage the pet’s vision by the time they come to Dr. Pickett. “We see a lot of ir- reversibly blind dogs on our first exam, unfortunately”, says he. MOVING ON TO TOMORROW’S TOOLS Lately the clinical staff working with Dr. Pickett is using the Icare TONOVET rebound tonometer more and more for measuring the intraocular pressure on animals. The reasons for that are numerous: - Easy use. Especially students tend to prefer the TONOVET - Short “learning curve” for becoming proficient and get- ting reliable readings. - No need to use topical anesthesia to get a reliable reading. - Patients tolerate the measuring procedure well, because it’s short and painless. - Tiny, very light probe works even with the smallest of animals and is especially good for monitoring post-cataract surgeries as it gives an accurate reading even with a partial temporary tarsorraphy in place. THE VET FIGHTS GLAUCOMA IN PETS 16 WWW.ICARETONOMETER.COM
