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- Author or Editor: Jonathan Levine x
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Abstract
Objective—To determine sex, breed, and age distributions in a population of horses with cervical vertebral compressive myelopathy (CVCM), compared with contemporaneous control horses.
Design—Retrospective case-control study.
Animals—811 horses with CVCM and 805 control horses.
Procedures—The Veterinary Medical Database was searched to identify horses with CVCM and contemporaneous control horses registered between July 1974 and August 2007. Admission date, admitting institution, sex, breed, age at the time of registration in the database, weight, and discharge status (alive, died, or euthanized) were recorded for each case and control horse.
Results—On the basis of results of multivariable logistic regression analysis, geldings and sexually intact males had a significantly higher likelihood of having CVCM than females (odds ratio [OR], 2.0 [95% confidence interval, 1.5 to 2.6]; and OR, 2.4 [95% confidence interval, 1.8 to 3.2], respectively). Thoroughbreds, Tennessee Walking Horses, and Warm-bloods were overrepresented in the CVCM group, compared with Quarter Horses. Horses that ranged from < 6 months to < 7 years of age had significantly higher odds of having CVCM, compared with horses ≥ 10 years of age.
Conclusions and Clinical Relevance—Sex, breed, and age predilections were detected in horses with CVCM. Improved understanding of these factors will aid clinical recognition of the disease in groups that may have a high prevalence of CVCM or were previously not recognized to be commonly affected. The results may also stimulate future investigations to further delineate etiopathogenesis, such as breed-related genetic causality.
Abstract
Objective—To evaluate a questionnaire for obtaining owner-perceived, weighted quality-oflife assessments for dogs with spinal cord injuries.
Design—Evaluation study.
Animals—100 dogs with spinal cord injuries and 48 healthy control dogs.
Procedures—The questionnaire was adapted from a questionnaire (the schedule for the evaluation of individual quality of life–direct weighting) used for human patients. Specifically, owners were asked to identify 5 areas or activities they believed had the most influence on their dogs' quality of life, assess their dogs' current status in each of those areas, and provide a weighting for the importance of each area. Results were used to construct a weighted quality-of-life score ranging from 0 to 100 for each dog. Owners were also asked to provide a quality-of-life score with a visual analog scale (VAS).
Results—A good correlation was found between weighted and VAS quality-of-life scores. Dogs with spinal cord injuries had weighted quality-of-life scores that were significantly lower than scores for control dogs. Quality-of-life areas and activities provided by owners of dogs with spinal cord injuries were similar to areas and activities provided by owners of healthy control dogs and could mostly be encompassed by 5 broader domains: mobility, play or mental stimulation, health, companionship, and other.
Conclusions and Clinical Relevance—Results suggested that the questionnaire could be used to obtain owner-perceived, weighted quality-of-life assessments for dogs with spinal cord injuries. Obtaining owner-perceived quality-of-life assessments for individual dogs should allow veterinarians to better address quality-of-life concerns and expectations of owners.
Abstract
Objective—To evaluate changes over time in owner-perceived, weighted quality-of-life assessments in dogs with spinal cord injuries and determine whether scores were associated with underlying etiology or with veterinarian-assigned scores for severity of neurologic dysfunction.
Design—Cohort study.
Animals—100 dogs with spinal cord injury.
Procedures—Duration of dysfunction, modified Frankel neurologic injury score, and etiology were recorded. At initial and recheck (4- to 6-week) evaluations, owners were asked to identify 5 areas or activities they believed had the most influence on their dogs' quality of life, assess their dogs' current status in each area, and provide a weighting for the importance of each area; results were used to construct a weighted quality-of-life score. Owners were also asked to provide a quality-of-life score with a visual analog scale (VAS).
Results—At initial and recheck evaluations, weighted quality-of-life scores were higher for ambulatory than for nonambulatory dogs. However, scores did not differ among groups when dogs were grouped on the basis of underlying etiology or duration of injury. Dogs with an increase in Frankel score between the initial and recheck evaluations had a significant increase in weighted quality-of-life score, whereas for dogs that did not have any change in Frankel score, initial and recheck weighted quality-of-life scores were not significantly different.
Conclusions and Clinical Relevance—Results suggested that owner-assigned, weighted quality-of-life scores for dogs with spinal cord injuries did not vary significantly on the basis of underlying etiology or duration of injury but were higher for ambulatory than for nonambulatory dogs.
Abstract
Objective—To determine whether body weight, body condition score, or various body dimensions were associated with acute thoracolumbar intervertebral disk extrusion or protrusion and whether any of these factors were associated with severity of clinical signs in Dachshunds.
Design—Cross-sectional clinical study.
Animals—75 Dachshunds with (n = 39) or without (36) acute thoracolumbar intervertebral disk extrusion or protrusion.
Procedures—Signalment, various body measurements, body weight, body condition score, and spinal cord injury grade were recorded at the time of initial examination.
Results—Mean T1-S1 distance and median tuber calcaneus–to–patellar tendon (TC-PT) distance were significantly shorter in affected than in unaffected dogs. A 1-cm decrease in T1-S1 distance was associated with a 2.1-times greater odds of being affected, and a 1-cm decrease in TC-PT distance was associated with an 11.1-times greater odds of being affected. Results of multivariable logistic regression also indicated that affected dogs were taller at the withers and had a larger pelvic circumference than unaffected dogs, after adjusting for other body measurements. Results of ordinal logistic regression indicated that longer T1-S1 distance, taller height at the withers, and smaller pelvic circumference were associated with more severe spinal cord injury.
Conclusions and Clinical Relevance—Results suggest that certain body dimensions may be associated with acute thoracolumbar intervertebral disk extrusion or protrusion in Dachshunds and, in affected dogs, with severity of neurologic dysfunction.
Abstract
Objective—To evaluate the association between spondylosis deformans and clinical signs of intervertebral disk disease (IVDD) in dogs.
Design—Retrospective case series.
Animals—210 dogs.
Procedure—Records of 172 dogs with clinical signs of IVDD and 38 dogs with other neurologic disorders were reviewed. Signalment, sites of spondylosis, severity of associated osteophytosis, type of disk herniation, and duration of signs were recorded.
Results—Dogs with IVDD had significantly fewer sites of involvement and lower grades of spondylosis deformans, compared with those in the non-IVDD group. When groups were adjusted for age and weight via multivariate linear regression, there were no differences in severity of osteophytosis or number of affected sites. Dogs with type II disk disease had higher numbers of affected sites and more severe changes, compared with dogs with type I disk herniation. There was no difference between groups in the rate at which IVDD was diagnosed at sites of spondylosis, compared with the rate at which IVDD was diagnosed in unaffected disk spaces. Areas of spondylosis were closer to sites of IVDD that elicited clinical signs than to randomly chosen intervertebral spaces, and distances between sites of spondylosis and sites of IVDD had a bimodal appearance.
Conclusions and Clinical Relevance—An association may exist between radiographically apparent spondylosis and type II disk disease; type I disk disease was not associated with spondylosis. Spondylosis in radiographs of dogs with suspected type I disk disease is not clinically important. Spatial associations among sites of spondylosis and sites of IVDD may be coincidental or associated with vertebral column biomechanics.
Abstract
Objective—To determine complications and neurologic outcomes associated with dexamethasone administration to dogs with surgically treated thoracolumbar intervertebral disk herniation, compared with dogs not receiving dexamethasone.
Design—Retrospective case series.
Animals—161 dogs with surgically confirmed thoracolumbar disk herniation.
Procedures—Medical records from 2 hospitals were used to identify dogs that had received dexamethasone < 48 hours prior to admission (dexamethasone group dogs), dogs that received glucocorticoids other than dexamethasone < 48 hours prior to admission (other-glucocorticoid group dogs), and dogs that received no glucocorticoids (nontreatment group dogs). Signalment, neurologic injury grade, laboratory data, and complications were extracted from medical records.
Results—Dexamethasone group dogs were 3.4 times as likely to have a complication, compared with other-glucocorticoid or nontreatment group dogs. Dexamethasone group dogs were 11.4 times as likely to have a urinary tract infection and 3.5 times as likely to have diarrhea, compared with other-glucocorticoid or nontreatment group dogs. No differences in neurologic function at discharge or recheck evaluation were detected among groups.
Conclusions and Clinical Relevance—Results indicated that treatment with dexamethasone before surgery is associated with more adverse effects, compared with treatment with glucocorticoids other than dexamethasone or no treatment with glucocorticoids, in dogs with thoracolumbar intervertebral disk herniation. In this study population, no difference in outcome was found among groups. These findings suggest that the value of dexamethasone administration before surgery in dogs with thoracolumbar disk herniation should be reconsidered.
Abstract
Objective—To examine associations between CSF biomarkers, initial neurologic dysfunction, and long-term ambulatory outcome in dogs with acute intervertebral disk herniation (IVDH).
Design—Prospective clinical study.
Animals—54 dogs with acute thoracolumbar IVDH and 16 clinically normal dogs.
Procedures—For each dog, variables, including CSF myelin basic protein (MBP), lactate, calcium, glucose, and total protein concentrations; nucleated cell count; and creatine kinase (CK) and aspartate aminotransferase activities, were measured. For dogs with thoracolumbar IVDH, initial neurologic function was characterized by use of a modified Frankel score (MFS; determined on a scale of 0 to 5, where 0 represented paraplegia with no deep nociception and 5 represented paraspinal hyperesthesia only). Long-term follow-up was assessed.
Results—Among dogs with thoracolumbar IVDH, those with CSF CK activity ≤ 38 U/L had a 35-fold increase in the odds of long-term ambulation, compared with the odds in dogs with CSF CK activity > 38 U/L, adjusting for neurologic functioning at the evaluation. The CSF lactate, calcium, and glucose concentrations and aspartate aminotransferase activity were not predictive of long-term ambulatory outcome. Data analysis revealed that long-term functional recovery was > 98% for affected dogs, regardless of their initial MFS, when CSF CK activity was ≤ 38 U/L and MBP concentration was ≤ 3 ng/mL.
Conclusions and Clinical Relevance—In dogs with acute thoracolumbar IVDH, CSF CK activity and MBP concentration appeared to be prognostic indicators and, along with initial MFS, can be used to predict long-term ambulatory outcome.
Abstract
Objective—To detect matrix metalloproteinase (MMP)-9 in serum and CSF and determine relationships between MMP activity and severity of disease, duration of clinical signs, and duration of hospitalization in dogs with acute intervertebral disk disease (IVDD).
Animals—35 dogs with acute IVDD and 8 clinically normal control dogs.
Procedure—CSF and serum were collected from affected and control dogs. Zymography was used to detect MMP-9.
Results—Activity of MMP-9 in CSF was detected in 6 of 35 dogs with IVDD; activity was significantly more common in dogs with duration of signs < 24 hours. Paraplegic dogs were more likely to have MMP-9 activity in the CSF than non-paraplegic dogs. No significant difference in hospitalization time was detected in dogs with IVDD between those with and without activity of MMP-9 in the CSF. Serum MMP-9 was detected more frequently in dogs with IVDD than in control dogs.
Conclusions and Clinical Relevance—Data were consistent with results of experimental rodent spinal cord injury studies that indicate that MMP-9 is expressed early during secondary injury.
