Toads (order: Anura; family: Bufonidae; genus: Bufo) are distributed throughout the world, but more species are found in areas of tropical and humid temperate climates. Although toads do not have a venom inoculation system, they are venomous animals because the glands covering the whole surface of their bodies secrete a milk-like venom of which composition is not yet completely known. Some of these glands are the bilateral glands located in post-orbital position. These glands, which are somewhat diamond-shaped and can be seen by the naked eye, are known as parotids. Toad envenoming in dogs may cause local and systemic alterations and may cause death by cardiac ventricular fibrillation. The electrocardiographic alterations observed consist of gradual deterioration of the normal standards with progressive appearance of negative ventricular deflections that can result in ventricular fibrillation and death if the envenomed dog is not promptly treated. Traditional therapy consists mainly of administration of atropine and propranolol; the latter used to prevent ventricular fibrillation

Toad envenoming in dogs can cause death by cardiac fibrilation (CVF). Traditional therapy consists mainly of atropine and propranolol, the last one used to prevent the CVF, that is preceded by negative ventricular deflections (NVDs) in the QRS complex of the electrocardiogram. This study intended to verify, comparatively, the lidocaine, propranolol, amiodarone, and verapamil abilities to prevent CVF in experimentally envenomed dogs. Thirty-six dogs were divided into 6 groups (GL, GP, GA, GV, GST, and GSV) with n=6; the dogs were submitted to volatile anaesthesia. The animals of the groups GL, GP, GA, and GV received 0.38g of toad venom through oro-gastric catheter and were treated with the following drugs respectively: lidocaine (4mg/Kg), propranolol (0.1mg/Kg), amiodarone (8mg/Kg), and verapamil (2mg/Kg). These drugs were repeated if NVDs reappeared with cardiac frequency >150, GST was not treated and GSV was just anaesthetized. The following results were obtained: GL, NVDs present in 4 animals, 100% recuperation with 3.66 doses/animal; GP, NVDs present in 2 animals, 100% recuperation with 1.66 dose/animal, with bradycardia at the anaesthetic return; GA, NVDs present in 3 animals, 33.33% recuperation with 1.5 dose/animal; GV, NVDs present in 4 animals, 100% recuperation with 2.16 doses/animal; GST, NVD present in 6 animals, 100% death and GSV, NVDs absent, 100% recuperation. As a conclusion, the anaesthetic proceedings used, did not cause NVDs, the envenoming that was not treated was lethal, and among the antiarrhythmics drugs used, verapamil was the most efficient, as it did not cause any serious bradycardia at the anaesthetic return and did not require repeated administrations. For lidocaine, it was efficient but required various administrations; amiodarone could not prevent the death of 4 animals; propranolol was efficient in relation to NVDs control, but caused serious bradycardia at the anaesthetic return

Venoms from snakes of the Bothrops genus are proteolytic, coagulant, hemorrhagic and nephrotoxic, causing edema, necrosis, hemorrhage and intense pain at the bite site, besides systemic alterations. Many adjuvants have been added to the venom used in the sensitization of antiserum-producer animals to increase antigenic induction and reduce the envenomation pathological effects. Gamma radiation from 60Co has been used as an attenuating agent of the venoms toxic properties. The main objective was to study, comparatively, clinical and laboratory aspects of goats inoculated with bothropic (Bothrops jararaca) venom, natural and irradiated from a 60Co source. Twelve goats were divided into two groups of six animals: GINV, inoculated with 0.5mg/kg of natural venom; and GIIV, inoculated with 0.5mg/kg of irradiated venom. Blood samples were collected immediately before and one, two, seven, and thirty days after venom injection. Local lesions were daily evaluated. The following exams were carried out: blood tests; biochemical tests of urea, creatinine, creatine kinase (CK), aspartate amino-transferase (AST) and alanine amino-transferase (ALT); clotting time; platelets count; and total serum immunoglobulin measurement. In the conditions of the present experiment, irradiated venom was less aggressive and more immunogenic than natural venom

345Pesq. Vet. Bras. 29(4): 345-352, abril 2009 RESUMO.-Devido ao crescente uso dos aloenxertos nas cirurgias ortopédicas, há a necessidade do conhecimento de suas características biomecânicas ao longo do tempo de preservação. O presente trabalho consistiu na aná-lise da força de resistência à micro-tração de amostras de ossos corticais de coelho preservadas em diversos meios por até 180 dias e a fresco. Os resultados revelaram que a resistência e o tempo de preservação apresentaram uma relação inversamente proporcional, significando que, quanto maior o tempo de preservação, menor a resistência física avaliada no ensaio biomecânico de resistência à micro-tração. Dos meios utilizados, a glicerina Due to the increasing use of cortical bone allografts in orthopedic surgeries, de knowledge of its biomechanics characteristics during preservation time is needed. The present study consisted in the analyses of the resistance power to the micro-traction of samples of rabbit cortical bones preserved in several means for up to 180 days and fresh. The results showed that the resistance and the preservation time presented an inversely proportional relation, meaning that, the longer the time of preservation, the shorter the physical resistance evaluated in the biomechanical rehearsal of resistance to the micro-traction. The glycerin has presented lower values in relation to the resistance test, showing, after 30 days, only 24.58% of the present power in the fresh bone, and by 180 days, 1.76%. The samples submitted to autoclavation also showed low values by the end of the experiment, while they remained with just 12.31% of the power present in the fresh bone. The bones preserved in homologous plasma, Dakin liquid and the ones cryopreserved showed the best levels of resistance at the end of the experiment, remaining, respectively with 82.47, 70.34 and 66.72% of the maximum power, while compared with the resistance of the fresh bones. The conclusion is that the choice of methodology and time of preservation interfered directly in the biomechanics of the cortical bones, promoting decrease of the resistance capacity to the traction along the period of preservation.

Degenerative progressive hereditary mieloencefalopathy is a disease described in young Brown