Veterinary Ultrasound Thermal Paper — What to Buy for Vet Clinics (2026 Guide)

Veterinary ultrasound has quietly become one of the highest-volume thermal printing environments in clinical practice. A busy small-animal hospital can run more pregnancy checks, bladder scans, and abdominal surveys in a week than a human OB/GYN office — and every one of those images that goes into a patient file or home with an owner comes off a thermal printer.

The problem is that almost every buying guide written about ultrasound paper assumes you work in a human imaging department. Vet clinics have a different fleet, a different budget structure, and a different physical environment. This guide covers what actually matters when you are buying paper for a veterinary practice in 2026.

Quick answer

Step one: identify the printer, not the ultrasound machine

This trips up more vet practices than any other part of the buying process. Your ultrasound system and your thermal printer are usually two separate devices from two separate manufacturers. The scanner might be a Mindray, an Esaote, a SonoSite, or an E.I. Medical unit — but the little black box bolted to the cart that spits out the image is almost always a Sony or a Mitsubishi.

Paper compatibility follows the printer, never the scanner. So before you order anything, walk over to the cart and read the label on the print box itself. You are looking for one of these:

• Sony UP-D897MD / UP-897MD — the workhorse of veterinary ultrasound. Compact, monochrome, and still in service in thousands of practices.
• Sony UP-D898MD / UP-X898MD / UP-D898DC — the current generation, increasingly common on newer vet carts.
• Sony UP-D895 / UP-895MD — older but very much alive in the field.
• Mitsubishi P93 or P95 (including P95DW) — widespread in veterinary and large-animal practice, and the reason mixed-fleet clinics get burned by the wrong paper order.

If you cannot find a label, the OEM — original equipment manufacturer — paper box currently loaded in the machine will usually tell you what type it takes. If you are working from an existing paper box rather than the printer, our full Sony compatibility index maps every paper code back to the printers it fits.

Veterinary compatibility table

Compatibility above reflects Durico's own published grade-compatibility chart. Note that the Mitsubishi paper codes K65HM, KP65HM, K61S, KP61S and KP61B belong to Durico's separate "Mibi" grades, which Precision Imaging Supply does not stock — the base 1100HD and 1100S grades are Sony-only.

Which finish should a vet clinic actually buy?

Durico builds the ULSTAR-1100 line in three surface grades. In a veterinary setting the choice is usually more clear-cut than it is in human imaging, because the end use of the print is different.

Standard / matte (1100S) — the default for most practices

Durico describes the S grade as the standard, matte-finish, most economical type. For routine chart documentation — bladder measurements, pregnancy confirmation, an abdominal survey going into the patient record — matte is the right call. It does not glare under exam-room lighting, it takes pen annotation without smearing, and it is the lowest cost per scan by a comfortable margin. If your prints mostly get stapled into a file or scanned into practice management software, buy 1100S and stop thinking about it.

High gloss (1100HG) — for client-facing prints and Mitsubishi fleets

Two reasons a vet clinic reaches for gloss. The first is presentation: equine and breeding practices, high-end small-animal referral centers, and anyone who hands a pregnancy image to an owner gets a meaningfully better-looking print off the HG grade — Durico's high-gloss grade is the one it describes as delivering brilliant, photorealistic reproduction. The second reason is purely mechanical: 1100HG is the only grade in the line that fits both Sony and Mitsubishi P93/P95 printers. If your practice runs a mixed fleet, standardizing on HG means one SKU on the shelf instead of two.

High density (1100HD) — for fine grayscale detail

The HD grade is semi-glossy and built for high-contrast grayscale. In veterinary work this earns its keep in cardiology, tendon and ligament imaging, and anywhere subtle tissue-texture differences need to survive the trip from screen to paper. It costs more per roll than standard, so most practices reserve it for the specialists rather than making it the house paper. Our grade comparison guide goes deeper on the differences if you are on the fence.

The mixed-fleet trap

Veterinary practices accumulate equipment. A clinic that bought a Mitsubishi P95 with its first ultrasound in 2015, added a Sony UP-D897MD with a used cart in 2019, and picked up a UP-X898MD when it opened a second exam room now has three printers and two paper standards. What usually happens next is that someone orders a case of whatever paper is cheapest, it does not fit two of the three machines, and the case sits in a supply closet for a year.

There are two clean ways out:

1. Standardize on 1100HG. It is the only grade that covers Sony UP-895/897/898 Series and Mitsubishi P93/P95. One SKU, one reorder, no sorting. You pay a bit more per roll than standard, but you stop wasting cases.
2. Label the printers. If cost per scan matters more than simplicity, keep 1100S for the Sony units and 1100HG for the Mitsubishi units — and put a physical label on each machine so nobody has to guess at 4:45 on a Friday.

Why compatible paper works in the first place

Thermal printers do not use ink. The print head applies precisely controlled heat to a coated film, and the coating darkens in proportion to that heat. Compatibility therefore comes down to two things: the roll has to be the right physical geometry, and the thermal coating has to respond to the printer's heating profile the same way the OEM media does.

Durico ULSTAR media is a five-layer construction — a polypropylene film substrate, a UV-cured glossy layer, a protective layer, the thermal coat layer, and a back-coat layer. Two features of that stack matter directly in a veterinary environment:

• A built-in anti-electrostatic layer. Durico includes this specifically to prevent thermal head damage. In a clinic full of animal hair and dry winter air, static is not a theoretical problem.
• Documented resistance to water, fingerprints, and ultrasound gel drops. Vet ultrasound is a messy business. Gel gets everywhere, hands are rarely clean, and prints get handled immediately. A coating that shrugs that off is worth more in practice than it sounds on a spec sheet.

Durico also lists easy tearing along the cross direction and minimal curling for flat filing — small things that add up across dozens of prints a day. Every roll ships individually sealed in a foil pouch, which matters if your paper lives in a mobile unit or a barn-side kit rather than a climate-controlled stockroom.

On the manufacturing side, Durico Coating & Technology self-manufactures at its own plant in South Korea, is FDA Registered, and is certified to ISO 9001, ISO 14001, and ISO 13485. Durico's accelerated storage testing runs at 40°C / 90% relative humidity for seven days and 50°C dry for seven days, with the ULSTAR media showing less fading than the competing compatible product in its published comparison. For an in-depth look at how long prints hold up, see our guide on color stability and archive life.

What this costs a veterinary practice

Sony OEM media is sold through medical resellers rather than at a single published list price, so figures move around. As of 2026, Sony UPP-110S typically runs somewhere in the range of roughly $85–$140 per 10-roll box depending on the reseller, contract, and quantity, with UPP-110HG and UPP-110HD carrying a premium above that.

Durico's own published figure is a savings of 25–30% compared to competing products, and that is broadly what practices see. Current pricing at Precision Imaging Supply:

• ULSTAR-1100S — $43.95 per 5-roll box or $82.95 per 10-roll box
• ULSTAR-1100HG — $64.95 per 5-roll box or $129.95 per 10-roll box
• ULSTAR-1100HD — $64.95 per 5-roll box or $129.95 per 10-roll box

For a practice going through a few boxes a month, that difference is not dramatic on any single order — it is dramatic across a year. Multi-location groups and referral hospitals should look at case quantities; the 1100 series ships 5 rolls per box and 50 rolls per carton, and our bulk purchasing guide covers how to size an order without tying up cash in a closet.

Frequently asked questions

Is compatible paper safe for veterinary diagnostic use?

Yes. Durico ULSTAR media is manufactured under ISO 13485 — the quality management standard for medical devices — and Durico is FDA Registered. The paper is engineered as a direct replacement for the corresponding Sony grade, matching roll geometry and thermal response so the printer behaves the same way.

Will using compatible paper void my printer warranty?

In the United States, the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act generally prevents a manufacturer from voiding a warranty simply because you used a third-party consumable, unless the manufacturer supplies that consumable free of charge. A warranty claim could still be denied if a specific defect were shown to be caused by the consumable — which is exactly why the anti-electrostatic layer and the head-matching surface finish matter. If your printer is under an active service contract, it is always worth reading the consumables clause.

My clinic runs a Mitsubishi P95. Can I use 1100S?

No. Durico's base 1100S and 1100HD grades are Sony-only. The grade that covers Mitsubishi P93 and P95 is 1100HG. The Mitsubishi-coded alternatives you may see referenced elsewhere belong to Durico's separate "Mibi" grades, which Precision Imaging Supply does not stock.

Why is the high-gloss roll 18m when the others are 20m?

The gloss grade carries additional surface layers, so at the same roll diameter it holds slightly less length — 110mm × 18m for 1100HG versus 110mm × 20m for 1100S and 1100HD. It is a physical consequence of the coating stack, not a shortfall. We break the geometry down in this guide to roll dimensions.

Where is Durico paper made?

Durico Coating & Technology, Inc. manufactures the ULSTAR line at its own plant in Sangju-si, Gyeongbuk, South Korea. Durico self-manufactures rather than outsourcing production, which is unusual in the compatible-media market.

How should I store paper in a mobile or large-animal practice?

Keep rolls in their sealed foil pouches until you load them, and keep them out of direct sunlight and off hot surfaces — a truck dashboard in July is the classic way to ruin a box. Thermal media reacts to heat by design, so the enemies are heat, direct sun, and solvents. The foil pouch handles humidity well; the rest is common sense.

Do I need different paper for equine versus small-animal work?

Not because of the species — the printer decides. Equine reproductive and tendon work tends to run on the same Sony and Mitsubishi units found in small-animal practice. What does change is the use case: if images go to a client or into a sale record, gloss is worth it; if they go into a file, matte is fine.

What to order

Not sure which printer you have? Send a photo of the label and the right grade can be confirmed before you order. It takes a minute and saves a wasted case.