Clinical Aspects of Surgical Treatment of Thoracolumbar Disc Disease in Dogs. A Retrospective Study of 300 Cases

Abstract

Neãas A.: Clinical Aspects of Surgical Treatment of Thoracolumbar Disc Disease in Dogs.A Retrospective Study of 300 Cases. Acta Vet. Brno 1999, 68: 121-130.The clinical records of 300 dogs with thoracolumbar disc disease treated by decompressive surgery at the Clinic of Surgery and Orthopedics at University of Veterinary and Pharmaceutical Sciences in Brno during a four year period (April 1994 through March 1998) were reviewed. The breed, age and sex predisposition, the frequency of disc extrusion at each intervertebral disc space in thoracolumbar region of spine, and the location of extruded disc material relative to the spinal cord were recorded. The number of patients with multiple disc herniations was also recorded. Dogs were grouped by clinical signs of disease into five groups (I, II, III, IVA, IVB and IVC grades). Recovery rates depending on the preoperative neurological grade of spinal injury and duration of clinical signs were compared. Patients were observed at least 9 months after surgery. All dogs were treated by hemilaminectomy without prophylactic fenestration of other disc spaces. The results of treatment in ten dogs with grade II involvement were excellent in 80% of these dogs, very good in 10%, and fair in 10%. The results of treatment in 68 dogs with grade III involvement were excellent in 80.88% of these patients, very good in 8.82 %, and fair in 10.29%. The results of treatment in 111 dogs with grade IV A involvement in which decompression was performed within 48 hours of the onset of clinical signs were excellent in 71.17% of these patients, very good in 12.61%, fair in 14.42%, and poor in 1.80%. The results of treatment in 56 dogs with grade IV A involvement in which decompression was performed later than 48 hours after onset of paraplegia were excellent in 46.43%, very good in 25.00%, fair in 17.87%, and poor in 10.70%. Hemilaminectomy was performed in thirty-one dogs with severe neurological dysfunction (group IV B) within 48 hours after onset of paraplegia. Outcome of the surgery was excellent in 22.58% of these patients, very good in 6.45%, fair in 48.39%, and poor in 22.58%. The results of treatment in 5 dogs with grade IV C involvement were excellent in 40% of these patients, and fair in 60%.Nineteen dogs died in the perioperative or early postoperative period and thus were lost to follow-up. Recurrence of neurological deficits in the remaining group of 281 clinical patients was assessed. The recurrence rate observed from 9 to 51 months after surgery, was 14.59 % (41 cases). Fourteen dogs had a recurrence of paraparesis (grade II and III) and twenty-seven dogs had paraplegia (grade IV) 1 to 30 months (mean 10.27 ± 7.25 months) after surgery. In all 41 cases cause of the recurrence was extrusion of other disc. Intervertebral disc disease, dog, spinal cord, hemilaminectomy, recurrenceIntervertebral disc herniations in thoracolumbar region of the spine are the most common cause of paralysis in dogs. Thoracolumbar disc lesions represent from 84 to 86% of the clinical cases of int...

Surgical treatment of spinal cord compression in client owned dogs with different grades of neurological dysfunction

“…The success rate of dorsal decompression in our study is comparable with previously published results [3,16]. Necas [8] indicated recurrence at the level of 14.59%, which is comparable with our results. The age of surgically treated dogs in our case was lower compared with previous studies [2,4,8,9], which may be associated with large percentage of chondrodystrophic dogs, for which the incidence age is lower.…”

“…The predominantly affected dogs in our study were German Shepherds and Dachshunds as also show some other studies [8,11]. More than the half of the evaluated dogs in our study belonged to the chondrodystrophic breeds, with the majority of lesions in the thoracolumbar segment as described in other literature.…”

Orthomanual therapy as treatment for suspected thoracolumbar disc disease in dogs ABSTRACT.

“…Dachshunds are predisposed to develop TLDD, making them a suitable model to study the effects of VOT in TLDD (Goggin et al, 1970;Ball et al, 1982;Olby et al, 2004). In this study, the mean age of the affected animals was 6.4 years, which is in accordance with previous findings (Mckee, 1992;Scott, 1997;Nečas, 1999). The most commonly misaligned vertebrae observed in our study were T12, T13 and L1.…”

Complications Related to Surgical Treatment of Intervertebral Disc Disease in Dogs

“…Postponed surgery worsens prognosis for paraplegic patients, and there is usually a need for longer recovery (Nečas 1999(Nečas , 2000. In such patients, the electrostimulation test is recommend to decide if there is any chance to succeed with surgery at all (Bauer et al 1992).…”