Peer-reviewed veterinary case report
Using rectal portal scintigraphy to diagnose and manage congenital
By Forster-van Hijfte, M A et al.Ā·Published in The Journal of small animal practiceĀ·1996Ā·Department of Small Animal Medicine and Surgery, United KingdomĀ·View original on PubMed ā
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Original publication title: Per rectal portal scintigraphy in the diagnosis and management of feline congenital portosystemic shunts.
- Species:
- cat
Plain-English summary
A group of five cats with a congenital portosystemic shunt (a condition where blood bypasses the liver) underwent a special imaging test called portal scintigraphy before and after surgery to close the shunt. Before surgery, the shunt was quite significant, but after the procedure, four of the cats showed a major improvement, with much less blood bypassing the liver. One cat improved in clinical signs but did not show a significant change in the imaging results six months later. Overall, the imaging test proved helpful in diagnosing the condition and assessing how well the surgery worked.
People also search for: cat congenital portosystemic shunt treatment Ā· cat liver disease symptoms Ā· feline portal scintigraphy results
Abstract
Five cats with a congenital portosystemic shunt (CPSS) were examined using transcolonic portal scintigraphy before and after surgical ligation of the shunting vessel. The mean shunt index before surgery was 52 per cent (range 45 to 61 per cent). Repeat portal scintigraphy, six to eight weeks after surgery, indicated a significant reduction in shunt index (mean 13 per cent, range 5 to 25 per cent) in four cats. In one of these cats a marked reduction in the shunt index, as determined by scintigraphy, preceded normal fasting blood ammonia. In the fifth cat there was no significant change in the shunt index, fasting serum bile acids and blood ammonia six months after surgery, although its clinical signs of hepatic encephalopathy had improved. Portal scintigraphy is useful in the diagnosis of CPSS and enables a quantitative assessment of the effects of surgery and may be a more accurate indicator of the degree of shunting after surgery than blood ammonia and serum bile acids.
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Search related cases āOriginal publication on PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/8642797/