Insulin therapy for dogs and cats.

Management of diabetic dogs and cats requires a tremendous cooperative effort between the practitioner and the client. Consistency in the handling, availability, and formulations of the different insulins will improve client compliance. In addition to insulin therapy, successful management of the diabetic animal includes the client's perceptions of the animal's health, maintenance of the animal's body weight, consistency in water consumption, and monitoring serial blood glucose concentrations. Serial blood glucose determinations improve the practitioner's ability to identify and address problems associated with insulin therapy, and thereby delay or minimize the complications of long-term diabetes.     

Unconventional diets for dogs and cats.

Food plays a far more complex role in daily life than simply serving as sustenance. Social and cultural factors along with individual beliefs govern people's eating behaviors, and it is likely that these same factors influence their choice of diet and feeding practices for their pets. Some people seek alternatives to conventional commercial pet foods, including commercially available "natural" diets, raw food diets, and vegetarian diets, in addition to a variety of home-prepared diets. Exploring a person's knowledge and beliefs about feeding pets can aid in understanding her or his motives for seeking alternative and may help in changing those practices when it is in the best interest of the pet to do so.     

Hydrolyzed protein diets for dogs and cats.

The primary aim of a hydrolyzed protein diet is to disrupt the proteins within the diet sufficiently to remove existing allergens. Published assessment of hydrolyzed protein diets includes physiochemical and immunologic assays as well as nutritional and clinical feeding trials. Potential problems include poor palatability, hypoosmotic diarrhea, and a reduced nutritional value, although persistent allergenicity is the most significant. The primary indications for a hydrolyzed protein diet are use in elimination trials for the diagnosis of adverse food reactions, and the initial management of inflammatory bowel disease. Initial studies of hydrolyzed diet efficacy are encouraging. Consideration of the source ingredients should be given when using hydrolyzed protein diets in elimination feeding trials because antigenic sites may not be fully destroyed.     

Hemangiosarcoma in dogs and cats.

Hemangiosarcoma (HSA, including angiosarcoma and malignant hemangioendothelioma) is a highly malignant tumor derived from the endothelial cell line and is characterized by early and aggressive metastasis. HAS is a common tumor type in dogs, but is rare in other species. Treatment options include surgery, chemotherapy, and possibly radiation, but survival times are invariably short (usually < 1 year), except for patients with superficial dermal HSAs. Further options to treat this tumor type are currently being investigated.     

Laparoscopy in dogs and cats.

Laparoscopic techniques have been developed in veterinary medicine for noninvasive evaluation of several organs, including liver, extrahepatic biliary system, pancreas, kidneys, spleen, bowel, and genitourinary tract. Biopsy procedures of these organs with minimal risk can be performed in most patients. This article reviews the equipment and technique necessary to perform laparoscopy in dogs and cats.     

Anticonvulsant therapy in dogs and cats.

This article reviews anticonvulsant therapies in current use for dogs and cats and briefly describes new modes of anticonvulsant therapy that are being investigated or pending publication. Most of the information contained within the article is based on published information. Some of the information, however, is based on the author's clinical experience and is identified as such.     

Thyroid tumors in dogs and cats.

The clinical presentation and biologic behavior of thyroid tumors vary widely among dogs, cats, and human beings. Although thyroid tumors in dogs are rare, they are most likely to be malignant. Clinical signs are usually the result of impingement on surrounding structures, and clinical hyperthyroidism is rare. In contrast, hyperthyroidism resulting from benign thyroid proliferation is relatively common among older cats. Malignant tumors are extremely uncommon but have high metastatic potential. Irrespective of the tumor's ability to produce functional thyroid hormone, scintigraphy is often helpful in the diagnosis and staging of thyroid tumors in all three species. Treatment with surgery is a reasonable treatment option for noninvasive tumors. Iodine 131 is a well-established treatment for thyroid nodules in cats, but its effectiveness in dogs is controversial. In dogs, external beam radiation therapy has produced more consistent results in affording local tumor control when surgery is not possible.     

Thyroid surgery in dogs and cats.

Thyroid surgery is indicated for malignant and benign neoplasms or hyperplasia of the thyroid glands. A ventral midline cervical approach allows for bilateral thyroid exploration. Care should be taken to avoid the surrounding neurovascular structures and esophagus. Evaluation of both thyroids should be done before proceeding with partial or complete thyroidectomy. Complications of thyroid surgery include intraoperative hemorrhage and clinical signs associated with damage to the recurrent laryngeal nerves, parathyroid blood supply, or parathyroidectomy.     

Optic neuritis in dogs and cats.

The term "optic neuritis" compromises all diseases of the optic nerve that cause primary demyelination and usually manifest themselves as a sudden visual field defect or total loss of vision in one or both eyes. As in man, the cause of optic neuritis is often difficult to determine in the living animal. Neurologic examination, cerebrospinal fluid analysis, and laboratory tests can be normal. Optic neuritis affects dogs far more frequently than other animal species. This article examines the causes of immune-mediated optic neuritis and etiologic differentials in dogs and cats, with comparisons to human beings and laboratory animal models.     

Diagnosing new autoimmune blistering skin diseases of dogs and cats

Autoimmune blistering skin diseases have been recognized for decades in humans and dogs. In the dog, most of these diseases unfortunately were grouped under the generic denomination of bullous pemphigoid without any confirmation that the autoantibodies targeted bullous pemphigoid antigens. In recent years, advanced diagnostic methods have permitted the recognition of new autoimmune blistering skin diseases in humans and companion-animal species. At this time, the diagnosis of these entities is made by combining clinical signs and results of histopathology. Immunologic methods serve to establish the presence of skin-fixed and circulating autoantibodies that target various epidermal or basement membrane antigens. In this article, salient features of the most common canine and feline subepidermal blistering dermatoses (mucous membrane pemphigold, bullous pemphigold, epidermolysis bullosa acquisita) and new variants of cutaneous lupus (type I bullous systemic lupus erythematosus and vesicular cutaneous lupus erythematosus) are presented.