Benny is having hydrotherapy treatment with one-to-one care from a highly-trained physiotherapist.

The three-year-old damaged his legs and needs the twice-weekly intensive therapy to help him walk properly ... even though Benny is a dog.

At Glasgow's Small Animal Hospital there are 11,000 treatments for sick pets each year and they have the same high-quality treatment as humans.

It is part of three main sections of the vet school, which also includes the Scottish Centre for Production Animal Health and Food Safety and the Weipers Equestrian Centre.

One of the main attractions of the facility – alongside world-leading cancer treatment – is the physiotherapy suite run by physiotherapists, who train with humans before specialising in animal care.

As well as dry physiotherapy – where pets are given exercises to do – dogs are also given sessions on a treadmill inside a small swimming pool.

They come in twice a week to help recovery post-surgery – and afterwards are hosed down in special showers and dried with hairdryers.

It's all part of the treatment at the leading teaching hospital where more than 40 vets – including 17 internationally recognised specialists – are supported by 18 residents and six interns. There are also five senior nurses, six specialised nurses, 14 support nurses, two radiographers and nine assistant staff.

They all care round-the-clock for dogs, cats, rabbits and reptiles.

The centre opened in 2010, replacing the cramped former Small Animal Hospital with a bright and airy eco-friendly building in Glasgow University's Garscube Estate.

Costing £10million, the centre was paid for largely by fundraising, raised with help from Evening Times and our readers.

Among the technology offered is also a cutting-edge linear accelerator – a machine that zaps cancer tumours.

Currently, pets have to travel to England for treatment but a new joint initiative with the nearby Beatson Institute has created a first class cancer research and treatment centre.

Small animals develop more than 70 different types of cancer and the linear accelerator can carefully target tumours without harming healthy tissue.

The centre also has a permanent MRI machine where, previously, a mobile unit visited the hospital twice a week.

David Bennet, Professor of Small Animal Clinical Studies, said: "The new hospital has vastly improved and changed the way we deal with pets.

"The quality of care and expertise our vets offer has stayed the same, but the equipment we are using is cutting-edge and the machinery, such as the MRI scanner and linear accelerator, is improving outcomes for our animals."

Over at the Scottish Centre For Production Animal Health And Food Safety the surroundings are not quite as bright and attractive.

But the work done in the £2.4million centre, which also opened in 2010, is just as vital.

Vets work inside a huge cattle shed where cows, pigs and sheep from Scottish farms are brought for treatment.

Most of the animals in the centre will not return to their farms – the aim is to make them healthy enough to enter the food chain, as well as conducting research into diseases.

The centre has an international reputation for training large animal veterinary surgeons.

They treat farm animals that have been referred to the centre and deal with surgical cases, as well as disease control and treatment.

Vets also lead the way in food safety and public health.

As in the Small Animal Hospital, the livestock centre has the latest hi-tech facilities, including cattle enclosures based on designs by renowned American animal scientist Temple Grandin.

Vet Tim Geraghty, who graduated from Glasgow Vet School in 2005 and came back to work there eight months ago, said: "Diagnosis and treatment are vital, particularly to farmers who want to keep their herds healthy and avoid outbreaks of disease.

"Our aim is to make sure meat eaten is safe and that the animals' surroundings are welfare friendly."

catriona.stewart@eveningtimes.co.uk

FOR 150 years the Glasgow University Vet School has been at the forefront of some the most groundbreaking work in caring for and treating animals. In the first of a four-day series CATRIONA STEWART went behind the scenes to discover how it has grown from having just 10 students to a world-class institution and a place Glasgow can be proud of