Research Communications of the 27(th) ECVIM-CA Congress: Intercontinental, Saint Julian's, Malta, 14th to 16th September 2017

Disclosures: No disclosures to report. A physiological heart murmur (PHM) can be identified in animals with no structural abnormalities of the heart and great vessels. It is a sound produced by blood flow, usually detected in puppies, but can be commonly observed in healthy young adult dogs. PHM may be a result of an increased sympathetic tone, and is possible to be secondary to anxiety. It has been described in some breeds and in athletic dogs during adulthood. A cross-sectional study was performed with 69 healthy Dachshunds, including 28 males (40.6%) and 41 females (59.4%), aging between 18 months to 10 years-old and weighting 8.4 AE 2.3 kg. The dogs underwent through physical examination, blood testing, echocardiogram, electrocardiogram, blood pressure measurement and thoracic radiography. No abnormalities were found. Systolic heart murmurs were detected in 36 dogs (52.2%): 32 (46.4%) with grade II/VI and 4 (5.8%) with grade III/VI (Levine/Freeman Scale). Murmurs were mostly located in mitral valve area (72.2%). Heart murmurs in adult dogs are frequently indicative of pathological conditions. However, none of the 36 dogs had structural heart abnormalities or systemic disturbances. Therefore, this study shows a high prevalence of PHM in healthy adult Dachshunds. Disclosures: No disclosures to report. Research of new biomarkers in body fluids to detect the primary problem is crucial in human and veterinary medicine. Although serum choline is suggested as emerging biomarkers in human and dogs with myocardial ischemia, there is no available data on usefulness of choline levels for predicting cardiac events. Therefore, this study was aimed to evaluate the use of choline concentration as a potential biomarker for distinguishing pleural effusions due to heart base tumors (HBT) and dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM), and determine whether there was a correlation between pleural and serum choline levels in dogs. Dogs with pleural effusion due to DCM (n = 11) and HBT (n = 8) were used as materials. Pleural effusions were diagnosed by clinical, radiological and ultrasonographic (US) examinations along with US-guided thoracentesis. DCM was diagnosed based on the sum of the scores (≥6 points) recommended by European Society of Veterinary Cardiology taskforce. Pre-operative diagnosis of HBTs was confirmed by histopathological evaluations showing mesothelioma, chemodectoma, hemangiosarcoma, and aortic body tumors. Healthy age-and breed-matched dogs (n = 10) were used as controls. Serum free-choline concentration of each sample was analyzed by high performance liquid chromatography in triplicate and results were expressed as micromolar (lM).