Oesophageal foreign bodies are common in dogs. Endoscopic removal is a viable treatment option but few studies have assessed the clinical and radiographic features that would be useful in decision-making and prognosis.Dogs (n = 44) with oesophageal foreign bodies presented to the University Veterinary Hospital were assessed. Terriers and West Highland White Terriers were significantly overrepresented (p < 0.0001) and in those breeds the foreign body was significantly (p < 0.0001) more likely to be located caudal to the heart base. The majority (88.6%) of foreign bodies were bones or bone fragments.Group 1 (n = 30) included animals where endoscopic removal was successful and Group 2 (n = 14) animals where it was unsuccessful or not attempted because of evidence of oesophageal rupture. There was no statistically significant difference in age, sex, body weight, type, location and size of foreign body, recovery rate, short-term complications and long-term outcome between the two groups. Duration of signs prior to presentation and time to spontaneous oral feeding were significantly longer (p < 0.01 in each case) in Group 2 (five days and 120 hours, respectively) compared to Group 1 (2 days and 24 hours, respectively). Mortality was 11.1%. Long-term follow-up of 29 dogs suggested oesophageal stricture formation manageable by feeding alone in seven (24.1%) cases.Terriers appear predisposed to oesophageal foreign bodies. Success of endoscopic removal is adversely affected by duration of signs prior to presentation. Surgical removal negatively influences time to recovery. Stricture formation appears to be a relatively common complication and alternate measures for its prevention should be sought.

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These results confirm that significant hematologic differences exist in pretraining Greyhounds by 9 to 10 months of age, when compared with adult canine, nonbreed-specific reference intervals; however, these differences are less marked in Greyhounds 5 to 6 months old. Given these findings, it is unlikely that factors such as training or racing are responsible for differences in hematologic values between adult Greyhounds and other breeds.

BackgroundDogs with hyperadrenocorticism (HAC) may be more mildly affected at the time of diagnosis today, which could influence the prevalence of associated clinical and clinicopathological abnormalities and diagnostic test performance. Different low‐dose dexamethasone suppression test (LDDST) result patterns have not been evaluated individually.ObjectivesTo assess the current features of HAC and evaluate if the diagnostic test performance of individual LDDST result patterns differ.AnimalsOne hundred and twenty‐three dogs undergoing investigation for HAC.MethodsRetrospective evaluation of dogs in which a LDDST was performed and HAC confirmed or excluded by alternative means. Cases with basal cortisol concentrations (t 0) < 1 μg/dL were excluded. Each LDDST result was classified as (a) complete suppression (t 3 and t 8 < 1 μg/dL), (b) lack of suppression (t 3 and t 8 > 1 μg/dL and both > 50% t 0), (c) partial suppression (t 3 and t 8 > 1 μg/dL but either < 50% t 0), (d) escape (t 8 > 1 μg/dL and t 3 < 1 μg/dL) or (e) inverse (t 3 > 1 μg/dL and t 8 < 1 μg/dL) pattern.ResultsFifty‐nine (48%) dogs were diagnosed with HAC and 64 (52%) with non‐adrenal illness. Hyperadrenocorticism cases had similar clinicopathological abnormalities compared to previous reports. Sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value (PPV), and negative predictive value (NPV) (95% confidence interval [CI]) of the LDDST for diagnosing HAC were 96.6 (91.9‐100)%, 67.2 (55.7‐78.7)%, 73.1 (63.2‐82.9)%, and 95.6 (89.5‐100)%, respectively. Lack of suppression pattern had the highest PPV (93.9 [85.8‐100]%) followed by the partial suppression pattern (67.9 [50.6–85.2]%) and escape or inverse pattern (36.8 [15.1–58.5]%).Conclusions and Clinical ImportanceA lack of suppression LDDST pattern has the highest PPV for diagnosing HAC followed by a partial suppression pattern. By contrast, the escape or inverse pattern provided limited support of HAC.

Total thyroxine (T(4)) concentrations were below the non-breed-specific reference range in 42 of 46 healthy young greyhounds (91.3 per cent) and 16 (34.8 per cent) were at or below the limit of detection of the assay. Free T(4) concentrations were below the standard reference interval in 20.5 per cent of the animals and 13 per cent were at or below the limit of detection of the assay. In contrast, all the dogs' total tri-iodothyronine concentrations were within or above the non-breed-specific reference range and 67 per cent were within the upper half. All the dogs' thyroid stimulating hormone concentrations were within the non-breed-specific reference range. The results show that young greyhounds have markedly lower total and free T(4) concentrations than other breeds, and neither analyte can reliably be used to investigate the hypothyroidism in this breed as values were found below the limit of detection of each respective assay.