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Management of veterinary anaesthesia and analgesia in small animals: A survey of English-speaking practitioners in Canada.

Authors :
Lalonde S
Truchetti G
Otis C
Beauchamp G
Troncy E
Source :
PloS one [PLoS One] 2021 Sep 28; Vol. 16 (9), pp. e0257448. Date of Electronic Publication: 2021 Sep 28 (Print Publication: 2021).
Publication Year :
2021

Abstract

Objective: To describe how small animal anaesthesia and analgesia is performed in English-speaking Canada, document any variation among practices especially in relation to practice type and veterinarian's experience and compare results to published guidelines.<br />Design: Observational study, electronic survey.<br />Sample: 126 respondents.<br />Procedure: A questionnaire was designed to assess current small animal anaesthesia and analgesia practices in English-speaking Canadian provinces, mainly in Ontario, Alberta and British Columbia. The questionnaire was available through SurveyMonkey® and included four parts: demographic information about the veterinarians surveyed, evaluation and management of anaesthetic risk, anaesthesia procedure, monitoring and safety. Year of graduation and type of practice were evaluated as potential risk factors. Exact chi-square tests were used to study the association between risk factors and the association between risk factors and survey responses. For ordinal data, the Mantel-Haenszel test was used instead.<br />Results: Response rate over a period of 3 months was 12.4% (126 respondents out of 1 016 invitations). Current anaesthesia and analgesia management failed to meet international guidelines for a sizable number of participants, notably regarding patient evaluation and preparation, safety and monitoring. Nearly one third of the participants still consider analgesia as optional for routine surgeries. Referral centres tend to follow guidelines more accurately and are better equipped than general practices.<br />Conclusions and Clinical Relevance: A proportion of surveyed Canadian English-speaking general practitioners do not follow current small animal anaesthesia and analgesia guidelines, but practitioners working in referral centres are closer to meet these recommendations.<br />Competing Interests: The authors have read the journal’s policy and the authors of this paper have the following competing interests: ArthroLab Inc., as partner in a funding grant. The joint ArthroLab – NSERC funding only participated indirectly by covering partially the salary of COT. The specific roles of this author are articulated in the ‘author contributions’ section. The authors received support from the company Dispomed Inc., i.e. to deliver the electronic survey to their clients. This has been detailed in the text. The funders, either governmental (NSERC and MITACS) or commercial (ArthroLab Inc., Dispomed Inc.) had no role in the present study. This does not alter our adherence to PLOS ONE policies on sharing data and materials. There are no patents, products in development or marketed products to declare.

Details

Language :
English
ISSN :
1932-6203
Volume :
16
Issue :
9
Database :
MEDLINE
Journal :
PloS one
Publication Type :
Academic Journal
Accession number :
34582482
Full Text :
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257448