2024-01-08 13:15:00
While the patient lay anesthetized on a table, a cardiologist made an incision in his chest. She removed a small implanted heart monitor with failing batteries and inserted a new one.
The patient had been diagnosed with heart disease; The monitor would provide continuous data on heart rate and rhythm, alerting their doctors to irregularities. Closing the incision required four stitches. In a few hours, the patient, a gorilla named Winston, would be reunited with his family at the San Diego Zoo Safari Park in California.
“Winston, 51, is a very old male gorilla,” said Matt Kinney, senior veterinarian at the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance, who led the medical staff during the procedure. With better health care, new technologies and better nutrition, “we see animals living longer and also being healthier for longer,” he said.
With “human-managed care,” gorillas can now live two decades longer than the 30 to 40 years that are common in the wild. However, as with their human relatives, aging also leads to chronic diseases. Gorillas are prone to heart disease, the leading cause of death for them and us. So now the questions for caregivers resemble those faced by doctors and older human patients: How much treatment is too much?
To keep gorillas healthy, zoo veterinarians not only turn to technologies and medications developed for humans, but also consult with medical specialists such as cardiologists, radiologists, obstetricians and dentists.
Winston takes four heart medications that people also take, although in different doses. (He weighs 205 kilos). The heart monitor he received is also implanted in humans. He received his annual flu shot this fall and is receiving physical therapy for arthritis.
Several of Winston’s long-time caregivers have retired. But Winston is still at work, leading his pack of five gorillas, keeping the peace.
“He’s such a gentle silverback and an incredibly tolerant father,” said Jim Haigwood, curator of the San Diego Zoo Safari Park. “He will still allow his youngest daughter to take food from his mouth.”
The zoo has twice introduced females with children to the herd, which in the wild might lead to infanticide. “He raised those males as if they were his own children,” Haigwood said.
Winston, a western lowland gorilla native to Central Africa, arrived at the San Diego Zoo in 1984. He enjoyed solid health until 2017, when his keepers noticed “a general slowdown,” said Kinney, who performed Winston’s first echocardiogram. . The test showed only “a couple of subtle changes, nothing alarming,” he said.
Then, in 2021, the entire herd contracted coronavirus. “Winston was the most severely affected,” Kinney said. After an infusion of monoclonal antibodies, Winston recovered.
While Winston was being treated, veterinarians and doctors found concerning health problems. His heart had begun to pump less efficiently; that led to a daily regimen of medications hidden in his food and the implanted monitor. He also takes ibuprofen and acetaminophen for arthritis. More concerning was a CT scan and biopsy that showed a cancerous tumor damaging Winston’s right kidney.
After considering Winston’s life expectancy and determining that the tumor was not growing, “we felt comfortable with continuing to monitor him,” Kinney said.
“We want to make sure Winston is living a good life, that he feels fulfilled,” he said. “We have a good understanding of what makes Winston, Winston.”
PAULA SPAN. THE NEW YORK TIMES
BBC-NEWS-SRC: http://www.nytsyn.com/subscribed/stories/7052053, IMPORTING DATE: 2024-01-02 19:15:05
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