In a move that we\u2019re surprised not to have seen from Madagascar\u2019s Melman, a giraffe living at a UK zoo is now breathing easy after learning how to use an inhaler.<\/p>\n
Mahiri, a 16-year-old female reticulated giraffe resident at Banham Zoo in Norfolk, has a long-term nasal condition that sees her get discharge from both nostrils, and that can make it difficult and uncomfortable for her to breathe through them. Though it\u2019s believed this could be caused by an autoimmune disorder, the exact cause of her condition is still unknown.\u00a0<\/p>\n
As a result, the staff who look after Mahiri have been treating the giraffe<\/a> based on her symptoms, which initially took the form of oral steroids, a type of drug that can help to bring down inflammation in airways.<\/p>\n But that wasn\u2019t a permanent solution. \u201cWith these animals, we don\u2019t want them on long term oral steroids. It\u2019s always the aim to get these animals off treatment or moved onto alternative therapies wherever possible,\u201d explained veterinary surgeon Dr Elliott Simpson-Brown in a video<\/a> posted on Banham Zoo\u2019s social media.<\/p>\n And so, three years ago, zookeepers began shifting Mahiri towards using an inhaler to provide her treatment, using a specially designed piece of equipment to fit her mouth and nose in, leaving room for a little snack inside as encouragement.<\/p>\n \u201cThe job of the inhalers essentially is to mimic what the oral steroids do, but in a much more targeted way. So, the inhaler therapy essentially opens up those airways [\u2026] and reduce the amount of discharge that\u2019s produced, and also her respiratory effort,\u201d explained Simpson-Brown.\u00a0<\/p>\n It was a long, careful process. \u201cGiraffe as a species can be quite nervous of anything new, so introducing medical equipment takes enormous patience and trust-building. Our keepers adjusted daily routines and worked at Mahiri\u2019s pace to help her feel comfortable,\u201d said Deborah Harris, Animal Manager at Banham Zoo, in a statement<\/a>.<\/p>\n The keepers started off with a nebulizer \u2013 which turns liquid medicine into a fine, constant stream of easily inhaled mist \u2013 before eventually weaning Mahiri onto the inhaler, which gives more direct puffs of her medicine.<\/p>\n After three years of training, Mahiri is now confident using the inhaler, and is almost at the point where it\u2019s hoped that the inhaler can replace the oral steroids entirely. \u201cThe fact that she now calmly accepts her inhaler is a real testament to the bond between her and her care team,\u201d said Harris.<\/p>\n The next step is to hopefully find out what the cause of Mahiri\u2019s condition is. \u201cTrying to get diagnostic samples off giraffe is not that easy,\u201d said Simpson-Brown. \u201cWhat we\u2019re going to need is some nasal swabs to test the actual discharge that we\u2019re seeing, as well as a blood sample.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSo, keeping everything crossed for the next steps, that we [manage] to get some answers and continue seeing her improve at this point.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In a move that we\u2019re surprised not to have seen from Madagascar\u2019s Melman, a giraffe living at a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":146103,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[49,48,66,323],"class_list":{"0":"post-146102","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-science","11":"tag-wildlife"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/146102","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=146102"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/146102\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/146103"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=146102"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=146102"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=146102"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}