2015 ACVIM Forum Research Abstract Program

One hundred sixty nine cats met the inclusion criteria. Ultrasonographic SI lesions were present in 132 cats in the duodenum (50), jejunum (67) and/or ileum (42). Histopathologic samples were obtained via laparotomy (60) or via necropsy (109). Diagnoses in cats with SI pathology included: inflammatory bowel disease (105), small cell lymphoma (16), intermediate-large cell lymphoma (14), other neoplasia (13), and suspected feline infectious peritonitis (10). Twenty five cats had no histologic lesions. Overall ultrasonographic lesions in the SI had high positive predictive value (PPV) for histologic SI lesions (duodenum 82%, jejunum 91%, ileum 88.1%) but poor negative predictive value (NPV) (duodenum 27.1%, jejunum 27.3%, ileum 40.4%). Table 1 shows the ability of ultrasound to predict histologic lesions in specific SI wall layers. The 95% confidence intervals (95% CI) are also reported. These results show that most cats with SI mucosal ultrasonographic lesions will have mucosal histologic changes. Mucosal biopsy may effectively identify these lesions. However, SI muscularis ultrasonographic lesions are not predictive of histologic disease in the muscularis layer, suggesting that full thickness biopsy may not be essential to obtaining a diagnosis in cats with ultrasonographic muscularis lesions. We conclude that ultrasound may help guide decisions about which biopsy type to perform in an individual cat. Little information is available about the outcome in dogs with protein-losing enteropathy (PLE).