A Corewell Health Aero Med helicopter touched down on Michigan State University’s campus Monday as part of testing for MSU’s new Spartan Canine Shield initiative — a program designed to airlift injured police and military dogs to advanced emergency care.
The effort centers on MSU’s Veterinary Medical Center, where emergency services and critical care specialist Matthew Beal says helicopters could soon bring working dogs from across the state directly to MSU for rapid, specialized treatment.
“We’re a specialty hospital, my team is emergency and critical care medicine,” Beal said. “But we have an on‑call surgery team, on‑call anesthesia team, on‑call blood bank, [and an] on‑call imaging team.”
To support the program, MSU has built a hospital‑wide response system that mobilizes critical care teams before a canine patient arrives. Beal says that speed is crucial when dogs suffer severe trauma or other life‑threatening emergencies…