Rotating Intern Texas A&M University, College of Veterinary Medicine Bryan, TX, United States
Abstract:
Introduction: Telemedicine facilitates convenient access to board-certified cardiologists and is widely utilized by veterinarians. Characterization of case submissions can help understand the value of this service.
Objectives: Describe a population of feline telemedicine cases with respect to submission indication, demographics, physical examination(PE) and type/stage of heart disease. Animals: Feline telemedicine cardiology cases submitted to IDEXX laboratories that included contemporaneous, bloodwork, ECG, echocardiogram, and thoracic radiographs (Nf400). Materials and methods: Telemedicine reports were reviewed, and results recorded.
Results: Breed was domestic short, medium or long hair in 64.3%, pure-breed in 32.8% and unidentified in 2.9%. Sex was male in 57.0% and female in 37.8% and unidentified in 5.2%. Median(interquartile range) for weight(kg) and age(year) were 4.7(3.6-5.9) and 9.0(5.9-13.0), respectively. Primary indication for case submission was pre-anesthesia work-up(37.5%), clinical-signs(27.5%), PE-abnormality(17.3%), re-evaluation(16.5%), and cardiac-screen(1.2%). The prevalence of murmurs was 76.5% overall and 81.0% in cats presented for PE or pre-anesthesia indications. Prevalence of dysrhythmias(PE or ECG) was 17.8% overall. Gallops were identified in 3.5% of cats. The echocardiographic diagnosis was normal(18.5%), equivocal(7.8%) and abnormal(73.8%). The most common abnormal diagnosis was a cardiomyopathy(94.9%). Represented ACVIM stages of cardiomyopathy included B1(52.9%), B2(16.8%), C(30.3%).
Conclusions: Cardiomyopathy is very common (73.8%) in this feline telemedicine population. Pure-breed cats were relatively common representing a third of the population. Pre-anesthesia work-up and clinical signs were the most common indications for consultation. Remote access to expert opinion via telemedicine results in a high prevalence of diagnosis of clinically relevant disease which results in recommendations that can help optimize care.
