As a student, I discovered my first ranula when my Magic, a female black Lab, woke up and was salivating all over the apartment. Luckily I lived over a veterinary hospital and I was waiting downstairs for one of the vets to arrive. A ranula is a collection of saliva that has leaked from a salivary gland that has become damaged. The most common causes are chewing on foreign materials, choke collars or bite wounds. In her case, a stick was not her friend. Dr. Prowse lanced it and all was well.
Over the past couple of months, I had a patient, Britt, whose ranula kept reoccurring. The first time I lanced it with a very sharp pair of small scissors and out poured the bloody saliva. Of course, I thought it was cool but the reaction by others in the room was more along the line of “oh gross!”
The second time it became enlarged, I attempted to lance it but nothing came out. The lining of the gland was significantly thickened. I warned the owner there was a chance we would need to do a surgical procedure called marsupialization.
Sure enough, it grew again so we went to surgery. Not going to lie, it was pretty neat. Basically I cut out the balloon and sutured the lining of the ranula to itself. Britt woke up pretty happy not to have the saggy balloon hanging out of her mouth.
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