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Background: Owners' perceptions and priorities regarding quality of life (QoL) are important considerations given the unknown efficacy of many commonly administered medications, stress of hospital visits, difficulties providing home care, and personal choices including euthanasia., Objective: To describe the relative importance of quality versus quantity of life to owners of cats with heart disease., Animals: Two hundred and thirty-nine cats with heart disease., Methods: Prospective questionnaire-based clinical study. Cat owners completed a questionnaire to identify important parameters when assessing their cat's QoL, the relative importance of quality versus quantity of life, and willingness to trade survival time for QoL. Variables associated with these parameters were evaluated with multivariate analyses., Results: Appetite, owner interaction, sleep patterns, and litterbox habits were deemed important to QoL. Concern over pet suffering was significantly greater than concern over life expectancy. Ninety-three percent of owners were willing to trade survival time for good QoL; 57% of these were willing to trade up to 6 months. On multivariate analysis, the only factor significantly (P=.002) associated with willingness to trade 6 months was study site. Owner concern regarding stress of administering medications at home increased with number and frequency of medications., Conclusions and Clinical Relevance: These results indicated that QoL is more important to owners of cats with heart disease than longevity. The various priorities and concerns of cat owners should be taken into account in order to provide optimal care., (Copyright © 2010 by the American College of Veterinary Internal Medicine.)

Clinical cardiac abnormalities developed in 32 of 175 dogs that had various malignancies and were treated with doxorubicin: 31 dogs had electrocardiographic abnormalities including arrhythmias and nonspecific alterations in the R wave, ST segment, or QRS duration and 7 dogs had congestive heart failure. All seven dogs that had congestive heart failure died within 90 days. At necropsy, 13 of 32 affected dogs had noninflammatory myocardial degeneration, myocytolysis, vacuolation, and/or fibrosis and there was intramural coronary arteriosclerosis in all 13. Five dogs with lymphosarcoma were in complete clinical remission when they died of doxorubicin-induced cardiomyopathy, but the overall survival times of the lymphosarcoma subset was nevertheless longer than in previous studies. The clinical use of doxorubicin in the dog can cause cardiotoxicosis but the therapeutic benefit appears to outweigh risks in most dogs.

Echocardiography in veterinary medicine has both enhanced our ability to diagnose and treat cardiac diseases in small animals and added confusion to what we already know. Because we can actually see the heart beating and visualize blood flows within the cardiac chambers as well as measure velocities of blood flows, we have a tool that increases our non-invasive diagnostic abilities. On the other hand, the lines between different heart diseases are not always clear-cut, and the more we learn about heart disease the more we see the shades of distinction between different diseases become blurred. This chapter will look at the main abnormalities we see in veterinary medicine (mitral regurgitation, pericardial disease, and the different feline and canine cardiomyopathies) and will attempt to help the veterinary echocardiographer avoid common problems encountered in acquired heart disease as well as use echocardiographic information to gain a better understanding of the disease process occurring in animals.

Cardiac disease in companion animals constitutes a significant part of veterinary medicine. Because of the nature of the problems encountered, emotional problems in the owners can be expected to arise. The major difficulty in dealing with cardiac problems in small animals arises from the uncertainty of prognosis and the frequency of sudden death. This chapter reviews the most prevalent heart diseases seen in companion animals and offers ways of explaining to clients the disease process, different treatments available (and their side effects), and more importantly, prognosis. Many problems can be avoided if good client communications are established early in the course of therapy.