Birds can also be placed in urine collection pens. Essentially, these are pens with sloping plastic floors. Urine runs away from the rest of the dropping. It is hard to avoid contamination, but useable samples can usually be obtained. Once available, urine is sucked into a syringe. Urine can be examined microscopically and also its specific gravity and total protein can be evaluated using a refractometer. Various colour-coded test strips (for example, Combur 9) are available to test urine for glucose, blood and other parameters.
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Further tests following radiography confirmed the presence of proventricular cancer. The bird was euthanased. Autopsy revealed the presence of a malignant tumour, called an adenocarcinoma, in the wall of the proventriculus. In the above photo the glandular stomach has been opened; the pale pink tissue in the dorsal wall is the cancer.
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