Peer-reviewed veterinary case report
Calcitonin hormone levels in cats with kidney disease and high calcium
By van den Broek, D H N et al.·Published in Journal of veterinary internal medicine·2018·Department of Clinical Science and Services, United Kingdom·View original on PubMed →
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Original publication title: Calcitonin Response to Naturally Occurring Ionized Hypercalcemia in Cats with Chronic Kidney Disease.
- Species:
- cat
Plain-English summary
A group of 33 cats with chronic kidney disease (CKD) and high calcium levels were studied to see how their bodies responded to calcitonin, a hormone that helps regulate calcium. The researchers found that while some cats had higher levels of calcitonin, it didn't seem to play a significant role in managing their calcium levels. This suggests that calcitonin may not be an effective treatment for high calcium in cats with CKD. If your cat has CKD and high calcium, talk to your vet about other treatment options.
People also search for: cat kidney disease high calcium treatment · chronic kidney disease in cats · calcitonin for cats with CKD
Abstract
BACKGROUND: Hypercalcemia is commonly associated with chronic kidney disease (CKD) in cats. OBJECTIVES: To explore the calcitonin response to naturally occurring ionized hypercalcemia in cats with azotemic CKD, and to assess the relationship of plasma calcitonin with ionized calcium, alkaline phosphatase (ALP), and urinary calcium excretion. ANIMALS: Thirty-three client-owned cats with azotemic CKD and ionized hypercalcemia from first opinion practice. METHODS: Cohort study. Calcitonin was measured with an immunoradiometric assay in heparinized plasma. Simple correlations were assessed with Kendall's rank correlation, and the within-subject correlations of calcitonin with ionized calcium and other clinicopathological variables were calculated with a bivariate linear mixed effects model. RESULTS: Calcitonin concentrations above the lower limit of detection (>1.2 pg/mL; range, 1.7-87.2 pg/mL) were observed in 11 of 33 hypercalcemic cats (responders). Blood ionized calcium concentration did not differ significantly between responders (median, 1.59 [1.46, 1.66] mmol/L) and nonresponders (median, 1.48 [1.43, 1.65] mmol/L; P = 0.22). No evidence was found for calcitonin and ionized calcium to correlate between cats (τ = 0.14; P = 0.31; n = 33), but significant positive correlation was evident within individual responders over time (within-subject correlation coefficient [r], 0.83; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.63-0.92). Calcitonin correlated negatively over time with plasma ALP (r, -0.55; 95% CI, -0.79 to -0.16). CONCLUSIONS AND CLINICAL IMPORTANCE: Calcitonin does not appear to have an important role in calcium metabolism in cats with CKD.
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Search related cases →Original publication on PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29469976/