Peer-reviewed veterinary case report
Echocardiographic assessment of lung blood flow resistance in 459
By Stavri, Alba et al.·Published in Journal of veterinary internal medicine·2026·Department of Veterinary Clinical Sciences, United States·View original on PubMed →
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Original publication title: Echocardiographic evaluation of pulmonary vascular resistance in 459 dogs with Doppler-derived pulmonary hypertension.
- Species:
- dog
Plain-English summary
A group of 459 dogs with pulmonary hypertension (PH) underwent echocardiographic tests to measure their pulmonary vascular resistance (PVR), which helps assess the severity of their condition. The study found that dogs with different types of PH had varying levels of PVR, indicating that measuring PVR can provide important information about their heart health. Some dogs showed unusual results where their PVR and blood pressure readings didn’t match, suggesting that understanding PVR could help veterinarians better evaluate and treat these dogs. More research is needed, but this could lead to improved care for dogs with PH.
People also search for: dog pulmonary hypertension treatment · high blood pressure in dogs · dog heart disease symptoms
Abstract
BACKGROUND: Abnormally high pulmonary vascular resistance (PVR) is prognostically important and a direct therapeutic target. There is a lack of data on PVR in dogs with pulmonary hypertension (PH). HYPOTHESIS/OBJECTIVES: Echocardiographic evaluation of PVR in dogs with PH is feasible and clinically useful for more comprehensive characterization of PH and provides valuable information beyond that derived from Doppler-derived PH assessment alone. ANIMALS: Four hundred fifty-nine client-owned dogs with echocardiographically-determined PH and 38 control dogs. METHODS: Retrospective cross-sectional study. Eighteen clinical and 46 echocardiographic variables were evaluated. PVR was calculated using 3 equations validated in people. Dogs with precapillary PH (pre-PH), postcapillary PH (post-PH), isolated post-PH (Ipc-PH), and combined post- and pre-PH (Cpc-PH) were compared using common statistical tests for continuous and categorical data. RESULTS: There were 213 dogs with pre-PH and 246 dogs with post-PH (86 with Ipc-PH, 160 with Cpc-PH). Average PVR (mean ± SD or median/range) was 2.5 ± 0.9 WU, 8.8 (1.5-28) WU, 4.6 (1.2-6.1) WU, and 9.2 (6.1-26.8) WU in control dogs and dogs with pre-PH, Ipc-PH, and Cpc-PH, respectively (P < .001). In 28 dogs with post-PH discordant changes of PVR and systolic pulmonary artery pressure (SPAP) were observed. These dogs had either normal or mildly increased SPAP (48 ± 4 mmHg) and high PVR (8.8 ± 2.1 WU) or high SPAP (80 ± 15 mmHg) and normal PVR (4.4 ± 1.2 WU), identifying dogs where estimation of PVR would be most useful. CONCLUSIONS AND CLINICAL IMPORTANCE: Evaluations of PVR might be considered in the clinical assessment of dogs with echocardiographically-determined PH but more study is needed.
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Search related cases →Original publication on PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/41910423/