A 550-Pound Siberian Tiger’s Toothache Tests the Capabilities of Dentists, High-Tech Operating Table : Cat With a Canine Problem

It was far too cramped to be a movie set and a little crusty for a hospital operating room.

But elements of both were molded into one Sunday when a 550-pound Siberian tiger named Reesha got a root canal.

Five television crews, half a dozen still photographers and as many assorted reporters converged in the rustic surgical theater of the Wildlife Waystation in Little Tujunga Canyon to record the event.

Two San Fernando Valley dentists who usually work on humans did the job. Several burly men with clip-on tape measures and walkie-talkies on their leather belts and a couple of slender young women attended.

A baby chimpanzee in a blue satin UCLA sweat suit cuddled all the women. Two caged toucans with nine-inch orange and green beaks squawked their unintelligible reaction to all this. Distant lions roared.

Beehive of Activity

Martine Colette, founder and guiding spirit of the mountain compound that succors the sick and neglected of the exotic animal realm, hustled here and there in a 10-gallon straw cowboy hat and a denim jacket that said “Coachella Western Stampede” on the back, giving orders, answering reporters’ questions, taking the telephone, responding to emergencies, holding Reesha’s paw and, in those precious idle moments, smoking a Tiparillo.

At the center of all this was Reesha, knocked into oblivion by a tranquilized dart blown from a tube. He was propped into a supine position, hind feet tied down with nylon cord, front feet tied straight up in the air, tail dangling over the edge of the table, glazed brown eyes staring out, the pink inside of his mouth propped open with an aluminum rig hinged to his canine teeth.

What a show it was.

But the real star of this show was none of the above. The star was the operating table.

It was a stainless steel, motorized beauty, seven feet long, articulated into wings to cradle the limp cat and with a flap to support the head, all of this suspended on hydraulic jacks that could tilt it in all directions and lower it to 16 inches from the floor.

It even had a heating system that circulated water from an electric heating tank through tubes embedded in the table to prevent hypothermia.

Work of 7 Students

The table was built by seven UCLA engineering students. The unusually ambitious project served two goals. For the students it satisfied a requirement for a senior engineering design project. For the Wildlife Waystation it allowed the retirement of a flimsy, four-foot table on which an anesthetized tiger looks something like a pizza on a saucer.

The wild animal refuge muddled along that way until last year when two volunteers who are employed by the UCLA School of Engineering decided to build a new table.

They sought advice from the school’s senior lecturer, Alexander Sampson. He immediately saw the possibility for a student project.

Each quarter, Alexander’s seniors struggle to think of something to build that could be used in the real world. Among their brainstorms have been a hovercraft-type vehicle, a walking machine and a machine that could carry 50 pounds of payload somewhere a human wouldn’t want to go.

The operating table had the appeal of being immediately needed.

A Unique Project

The seven students who tackled the project soon found that they were in deep. An investigation of the literature on operating tables turned up nothing designed specifically to meet the requirements of operating on an animal as large as a 1,000-pound bear.

Not even the Los Angeles Zoo had that, its veterinarian, Ben Gonzales, told them.

So they had to wing it.

“One of the real difficulties was to invent a hinge system between the table’s two moveable flaps so that a lion’s tail wouldn’t be caught in the crack,” Sampson said.

As they progressed, they found the costs rising above the $150 grant each received from the school.

Joe Becker, a Waystation volunteer and foreman of UCLA’s machine shop, dug into his own pockets to buy the stainless steel and the main hydraulic cylinder, which he scrounged from a retired trash truck.

The 10-week quarter ended, but the work continued.

“This developed a momentum of its own,” said Richard Sessions, executive officer of the School of Engineering.

A couple of weeks ago, the students delivered the finished table.

Reesha’s root canal--actually he had two teeth done and a third extracted--was to be its christening.

Two Valley dentists, Philip Shindler and Bert Kaufman, showed up in their Sunday clothes to do the job. Shindler carried his tools in an Army surplus bag.

At 11:30, a tranquilized dart was blown into Reesha’s cage.

Almost Slid Off Table

It took six bearers and a pickup truck to get Reesha to the operating room. When they slopped his limp bulk onto the table, he slid on the stainless steel and almost went off.

Wearing white plastic gloves, Shindler and Kaufman sawed off two canine teeth, plucked out the four-inch root with picks and filled the cavity with paste.

The cameras crowded in close when Shindler pulled a front tooth.

He explained each step of the operation cheerfully, spelled his name for reporters and joked around a bit.

Colette said Shindler was her personal dentist as well as her tiger’s.

“If I can do a tiger, I can do Martine,” he said.

Just before 1:30, Colette asked how much longer they would be.

“Fifteen minutes,” Kaufman said.

“ ‘Cause he is thinking of waking up,” Colette said.

“Twelve,” Kaufman said, reconsidering.

They wrapped it up in less than 12. Eight men carried the patient away.

Kaufman removed his gloves, washed his hand and addressed the chimpanzee.

“Ogh , Ogh!” he said, trying to impersonate a chimpanzee.

The chimpanzee smacked her lips at him.