Wehner Astrid, Koehler Ines, Ramspott Sabine, Hartmann Katrin
Center of Clinical Veterinary Medicine, Clinic of Small Animal Medicine, Ludwig Maximilian University, Munich, Germany.
J Feline Med Surg. 2019 Aug;21(8):741-749. doi: 10.1177/1098612X18799462. Epub 2018 Oct 17.
Present-day diagnosis of hyperthyroidism is often established in the early stages where clinical signs and physical examination findings typically associated with the disease may not yet be present. The purpose of this study was to investigate thyroid palpation score (TPS), total thyroxine (T4), body weight, body condition score and a clinical scoring index, which assesses severity of illness and quality of life, in untreated hyperthyroid cats, healthy cats and cats with non-thyroidal illness.
Fifty-five cats with hyperthyroidism, 45 healthy cats and 327 euthyroid cats with non-thyroidal disease were prospectively enrolled. A Kruskal-Wallis test was used to determine any differences between metric data. A χ test was applied to compare nominal data between the three subgroups. Correlation between two variables was analysed using Spearman's correlation coefficient.
Almost 80% of the hyperthyroid cats and up to 20% of the healthy cats and cats with non-thyroidal illness had a palpable thyroid gland. Median TPS in hyperthyroid cats was 2, which was significantly higher compared with the other groups. Although there was a significant correlation between TPS and T4 when evaluating all cats, this could not be demonstrated in the three subgroups. Hyperthyroid cats with larger thyroid glands (TPS >3) did not have higher T4 levels. Hyperthyroid cats with lower clinical scores had significantly higher T4 levels compared with hyperthyroid cats with higher scores. Hyperthyroid cats were older and had lower body weights and body condition scores than other cats.
Hyperthyroid cats were commonly found to have palpable thyroid glands, but they were smaller than previously reported.
目前，甲状腺功能亢进症的诊断通常在疾病早期确立，此时通常与该疾病相关的临床体征和体格检查结果可能尚未出现。本研究的目的是调查未经治疗的甲状腺功能亢进猫、健康猫和非甲状腺疾病猫的甲状腺触诊评分（TPS）、总甲状腺素（T4）、体重、体况评分以及评估疾病严重程度和生活质量的临床评分指数。
前瞻性纳入55只甲状腺功能亢进猫、45只健康猫和327只甲状腺功能正常的非甲状腺疾病猫。采用Kruskal-Wallis检验确定计量资料之间的差异。应用χ检验比较三个亚组之间的名义资料。使用Spearman相关系数分析两个变量之间的相关性。
近80%的甲状腺功能亢进猫以及高达20%的健康猫和非甲状腺疾病猫可触及甲状腺。甲状腺功能亢进猫的TPS中位数为2，与其他组相比显著更高。虽然在评估所有猫时TPS与T4之间存在显著相关性，但在三个亚组中未得到证实。甲状腺较大（TPS>3）的甲状腺功能亢进猫T4水平并不更高。临床评分较低的甲状腺功能亢进猫与评分较高的甲状腺功能亢进猫相比，T4水平显著更高。甲状腺功能亢进猫比其他猫年龄更大，体重和体况评分更低。
甲状腺功能亢进猫通常可触及甲状腺，但比之前报道的更小。
