Did you know that elephants also have their very own places where they get treated? It is called an elephant hospital! Like a hospital for human beings, it has big machines and unusual gadgets all around that may feel daunting to decipher. But worry not! Let’s guide you through each of the cool gadgets at the Elephant Hospital Campus (EHC) that are helping the rescued elephants heal.
Thermal Imaging Camera
This camera is nothing like your regular camera. If you ever get a chance to point it at your friends, their goofy smiles unfortunately will not be captured! Instead, it will capture the different temperatures across their body in various colours. Think of it as seeing heat energy, something that can not be seen with our eyes directly.
But what do all these colours mean? It’s simple. Let’s go back to your art class, remember how all the different colours we use are either warm or cool? In the image from the thermal camera, the colour of blue shows cooler temperature, while colours like red show warmer temperatures.
Now when these thermal imaging cameras are pointed at the elephants residing at our centres, the smart doctors know exactly where certain colours should and should not appear. So if they spot an area that looks unusually blue (too cool) or extra red (too warm), it can instantly signal that something is not right with the elephant’s health.
But why use such a device anyway? Unlike humans, elephants cannot tell us when something hurts inside their bodies. An injury or swelling may not be visible on the outside, but is causing them pain. With the help of thermal imaging, these kinds of wounds can be detected very quickly. The physical signs that something is wrong with the elephant only comes out weeks later. Thermal imaging can stop the elephant from reaching the stage where the wound inside would have worsened.
To sum up this thought, the camera of this gadget is colour coding the elephant’s problem so that its treatment can begin sooner. How clever is that?
Portable Digital X-Ray Machine
We say “cheese” and show all our pearly whites for photographs. But there’s a device that can capture more than that — it can showcase all the whites within our body!
Unlike the thermal camera that lets you see colours, an X-ray helps the doctors see the milky bones inside the body. These bones come together to form a skeleton that supports an entire body’s weight.
So why does this X-ray machine exist? Surely not to design the next Halloween costume. Doctors recommend getting an X-ray done if uncontrollable pain is felt in an area after playing sports or falling down. At human hospitals, these machines are fixed in a room, and you will have to adjust yourself for the machine to be able to see if there is any damage to your bone. Now imagine bringing an injured elephant to that room and trying to explain the precise position required for an X-ray. Next to impossible isn’t it?
Instead, elephant doctors use a smaller and portable version of the fixed device. The portable digital X-ray machine helps the doctors to easily take the machine to the elephant and the painful part of its body without any hassle. Even better, the images appear almost instantly, much like a digital camera. This helps the treatment begin right away.
Portable Ultrasound Machine
The ultrasound machine produces images that are different from the other machines we have talked about so far.
If you pay close attention to its name, the device works using sound waves to create images! Fascinating, right? It gathers the sound waves inside the body that are bouncing off tissues, and forms an image that presents how well the tissues, organs and blood are doing.
This machine, too, is movable to reach our rescued elephants where they are. Since the majestic mammals have developed trust in their doctors, they remain calm when this test is taken for their regular checkups! Elephants under our care had earlier spent their lives without eating healthy food. So along with organ health, the doctors get to know of the elephant’s body fat levels to decide their food menu so they can function normally.
Now that we have discussed a lot of gadgets that help doctors find problems, let us move on to some tools that help the elephants heal.
Laser Therapy Device
You must have heard the word “laser” from the popular game laser tag! But the laser we will talk about here is different. It does involve a similar beam of light, but this laser provides relief from pain to our elephants through a machine.
The expert elephant doctors know how to use this very small yet powerful machine. These devices, when turned on, spout out a very specific type of light that is able to enter the body and head straight to the tiny cells where it can repair damage. Providing this therapy over multiple sessions can help relieve the pain of elephants, especially the ones they face on their leg joints after years of work that they were forced to do.
Electroacupuncture Therapy
What a long word! But relax, and let us break it down for you. “Electro” stands for electricity, the same thing that charges your phone. “Acupuncture” is a therapy where tiny, harmless needles are placed at certain parts of the body. Join the words, and electroacupuncture means needles giving a gentle electric current.
We must tell you that human beings are also advised electroacupuncture therapy by their doctors so that the stubborn pain they have can slowly go away. And it’s not as frightening as it sounds. Imagine your body as a network of roads. The vehicles there are always busy delivering messages, and all of a sudden a traffic light stops working. But the cars, bikes and buses keep on moving, creating a confusion for the traffic coming from the other sides.
In the above example, “cars” and other vehicles represent signals that travel through our nerves carrying various types of sensations as “messages”. The “traffic light” is the body’s self-organised network that runs it. When this network malfunctions, it results in pain or stress in the body.
This is where acupuncture comes in. It is like placing a traffic police officer between the busy intersections to guide and restore smooth operation. Replace this traffic helper with a tiny electric needle and voilà, you’ve understood electroacupuncture therapy!
Gentle Giants Being Gentle During Treatment
The elephants that live in our centre willingly participate in interactions with elephant doctors and their caregivers as they have, over time, built trust with each other through a process called target training. Our expert staff have taught these elephants some useful actions they follow in exchange for delicious treats! This makes detecting problems and performing healing therapies with all these cool gadgets much easier as the elephants know what to expect when the actual treatment takes place.
But Wait! There’s More You Need to Know…
You may know Dr. Doofenshmirtz and his laboratory from the cartoon series Phineas and Ferb. Unlike his “evil inventions”, our elephant doctors spend hours in their very own labs to read and test out new ways to help the gentle giants heal and provide them with a better life. That makes them nothing less than superheroes!
Not only do these interesting gadgets remain at the hospital to heal the resident elephants, but also travel on the road with the Haathi Sewa ambulance, helping doctors treat Asian elephants all over India!
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Feature Image: Mradul Pathak/Wildlife SOS
