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Incidence and type of intravenous catheter complications in hospitalised dogs

USER-ALT Sydney Simpson and Kristin Zersen , Colorado State University , Fort Collins , USA

Intravenously administered medications and fluids are used in the treatment of many hospitalised veterinary patients . However , complications can occur with the use of peripheral indwelling catheters . The authors examined the incidence and type of complications in canine patients treated at a university clinic . The overall incidence of problems was 24.2 % in the critical care unit and 13.1 % in the intermediate care unit . Phlebitis was the most common complication in the critical care unit and line breakages were the most frequent in intermediate care patients . The authors suggest that using peripheral IV catheter placement and maintenance checklists , as well as force-activated separation devices and patient sedation , could reduce the incidence of complications .

Journal of Small Animal Practice https :// doi . org / 10.1111 / jsap . 13574

Training dogs to detect disease by the scent of saliva samples from canine cancer patients

USER-ALT Laurie Malone and others , University of Alabama at Birmingham , Birmingham , USA

The first case report describing how dogs can detect the scent of cancer in their owners was published in 1989 . Since then , there have been many studies examining whether dogs can be trained to recognise distinctive odours associated with neoplasms and other human disease processes . The authors investigated the accuracy of scent detection by trained dogs when applied to identifying cancers in their own species . Six dogs were trained for 6 months before being tested on their ability to discriminate between saliva from canine cancer cases and healthy controls . They were found to show a sensitivity of 90 % and a specificity of 98 %. The authors say further studies are needed involving larger numbers of samples and different tumour types .

Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association https :// doi . org / 10.2460 / javma . 22.11.0486

Effect of distracting noise on learning and task performance in working dogs

USER-ALT Elizabeth Sheldon and others , University of Lincoln , UK

Working dogs are trained to focus on specific aspects of their environment while filtering out extraneous stimuli . There could be adverse consequences for the dog , its human handler or other people if a dog is distracted while working . During the training programme for dogs learning to find improvised explosive devices , loud noises are introduced with the aim of the dogs becoming used to them . The authors investigated the effects of a distracting noise on a dog ' s ability to learn and its performance of the desired task . They found that dogs that were trained in silence learned the task more efficiently and that dogs that were trained with a distracting noise did not carry out the task any better when performing in the presence of different noises .

Applied Animal Behaviour Science https :// doi . org / 10.1016 / j . applanim . 2023.105977

16 Veterinary Nursing Journal