Welcome to ElephantNews.com in the coming months we will be brings you stories, video, photos and information on Asian Elephants and Thailand's efforts to help them. When we began this developing this website our first visit was to the world's only hospital exclusively for elephants. Located in Lamphang, Thailand the Thai Elephant Foundation's hospital provides care to sick and injured elephants free of charge.

While most patients are domestic elephants in exceptional cases the hospital will capture an elephant in the wild to take to the facility for treatment. When we visited the hospital there was one such elephant they had named Sampan . He was a sad case. About 2 years ago his right leg had become trapped in a snare set by a villager in Chachoengsao province. In Thailand as throughout Asia conflicts betweens elephants and farmers are increasing resulting in deaths on both sides. The villager's trap had broken Sumpan's right leg. The break resulted in a compound fracture with the bone protruding from his flesh just above his foot. Over the years the bone had healed on the outside of his body. As time passed a large bulbous mass complete with its own blood supply developed. His foot was permanently turned to the rear with the new bone growth becoming the point of contact with the ground for his right leg.

The Elephant Hospital had attempted to capture him without success. They had hoped other elephants in the area would would allow him to join their herd but instead they forced him out. He lived a solitary life. Despite his injury he was good as evading the elephant hospital's staff. Finally on March 6th of 2008 they were able to lure him from the jungle with the aid of a female domestic elephant. The little animal was very sick. He had developed severe osteomyelitis, an infection of the bone. The prognosis was not good. Despite a good appetite the ravages of the infection had reduced him to mere skin and bones. He spent much of his day resting in the facility's therapy pool. Dr. Sittidet Mahasawangkul the medical director at the hospital told us he exhibited the same behavior in the wild seeking to minimize the pain he experienced from the fracture and infected bone. Despite the heroic efforts of Dr. Sittidet and his staff Sampan died the day following our visit.

All of the other patients presently at the hospital are domestic elephants. Most are given to the Elephant Hospital when they can no longer work. Some are taken from their owners by the government when the animals have been abused. At the time of our visit there were two elephants that had been placed in the facility after they had been taken from Burma and used to transport illegal migrants into Thailand. One of the two was a very old cow. The other was much younger. The Thai courts will decide if the elephants remain in Thailand or are returned to Burma.