Internal medicine
Our UQ VETS Small Animal internal medicine specialists offer expert diagnostic work-ups of diseases in dogs and cats to prvoide the best treatment plan for your pet after referral.
You can get a referral for more complicated medical conditions, a specialist opinion, or for advanced imaging or diagnostic tests to help us determine the cause of your pet's illness.
Our internal medicine team includes dedicated nurses who are supported by specialist vets in other fields, ensuring we continue to provide high-quality patient care. We also support UQ VETS patients that have had consultations with other specialist services, including primary care.
For pet owners
Our internal medicine service is only available to referred cases. Your vet will organise this for you.
Note: we only see a limited amount of internal medicine cases so that we can provide and maintain high-quality specialised care. In future as our dedicated team grows, we hope to provide more appointment options.
For referring vets
To support our internally referred caseload, we only accept external referrals on a case-by-case basis.
See our referrals web page for information about how to refer or discuss your case.
Experienced internists
Our internists have experience in all areas of small animal referral medicine. Focus areas include endocrinology (particularly diabetes in dogs and cats), urinary tract disease and endoscopy.
Common diseases and disorders
Your vet may suggest referring your pet internally to our internists for a range of issues, including:
- anaemia or other bleeding disorders
- chronic vomiting or diarrhoea
- complicated pancreatic disease
- coughing and other breathing problems
- endocrine disease
- adrenal tumours
- complicated diabetes
- thyroid disorders
- infectious disease
- kidney or bladder disease
- liver inflammation
- unexplained weight loss
- weakness/collapse
- diseases of the nose and throat
- diseases of the immune system.
Common procedures
Procedures and advanced diagnostics include:
- endoscopy:
- gastroduodenoscopy
- colonoscopy
- rhinoscopy
- tracheoscopy/bronchoscopy
- cystoscopy
- endoscopic-assisted foreign body retrieval (GI, nasal and pulmonary)
- continuous glucose monitoring in complicated diabetics
- intensive care hospitalisation
- management of complicated or chronic cases in partnership with a primary care veterinarian
- bone marrow aspirate and biopsy
- placement of feeding tubes and nutritional management
- administration of chemotherapy for oncology patients
- cerebrospinal fluid collection
- ultrasound-guided organ fine-needle aspiration or biopsy
- coordination and interpretation of specialised diagnostic imaging studies (ultrasound, CT, fluoroscopy and MRI).