Repurposing medical devices as "button" esophagostomy tubes for extended nutritional support.

BACKGROUND: Esophagostomy tubes (E-tubes) are widely utilized for extended nutritional support in dogs and cats. Problems associated with their use include the unwieldy excess (10-20 cm) of external tubing, constant need for neck wraps and necessity for skin sutures, suture tract infection, and tube loss if sutures fail. OBJECTIVES: To evaluate 2 different, low profile (LP) "button" products intended for use in people as enteral (jejunostomy [J] and gastrojejunostomy [G-J]) feeding tubes for suitability as LP E-tubes in dogs and cats. ANIMALS: A young giant breed dog that required extended (>6 months) nutritional and fluid support during recovery from severe neurological illness with protracted adipsia, anorexia, and dysphagia. METHODS: Prospective evaluation of 2 commercially available LP feeding devices after placement of a standard E-tube. An LP J-tube and an LP G-J tube were assessed in consecutive 4-week trials, for tube retention, patient comfort, stoma health, and functionality. RESULTS: Both products performed extremely and equally well as LP E-tubes in this clinical patient, enhancing patient freedom and comfort by eliminating external tubing, skin sutures, and bandaging. The dual port G-J tube allows medication delivery (eg, sucralfate) to the entire esophagus, but for safety alone (ie, to avoid aspiration), the single port J-tube appears the best device for client-owned patients. CONCLUSIONS AND CLINICAL IMPORTANCE: The LP enteral feeding tubes from the human medical field can be successfully used as LP E-tubes in dogs and cats, offering superior patient comfort, with no obvious detriment to the patient and main drawback of higher cost.

Comparative pathophysiology and management of protein-losing enteropathy.

Protein-losing enteropathy, or PLE, is not a disease but a syndrome that develops in numerous disease states of differing etiologies and often involving the lymphatic system, such as lymphangiectasia and lymphangitis in dogs. The pathophysiology of lymphatic disease is incompletely understood, and the disease is challenging to manage. Understanding of PLE mechanisms requires knowledge of lymphatic system structure and function, which are reviewed here. The mechanisms of enteric protein loss in PLE are identical in dogs and people, irrespective of the underlying cause. In people, PLE is usually associated with primary intestinal lymphangiectasia, suspected to arise from genetic susceptibility, or "idiopathic" lymphatic vascular obstruction. In dogs, PLE is most often a feature of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), and less frequently intestinal lymphangiectasia, although it is not proven which process is the true driving defect. In cats, PLE is relatively rare. Review of the veterinary literature (1977-2018) reveals that PLE was life-ending in 54.2% of dogs compared to published disease-associated deaths in IBD of <20%, implying that PLE is not merely a continuum of IBD spectrum pathophysiology. In people, diet is the cornerstone of management, whereas dogs are often treated with immunosuppression for causes of PLE including lymphangiectasia, lymphangitis, and crypt disease. Currently, however, there is no scientific, extrapolated, or evidence-based support for an autoimmune or immune-mediated mechanism. Moreover, people with PLE have disease-associated loss of immune function, including lymphopenia, severe CD4+ T-cell depletion, and negative vaccinal titers. Comparison of PLE in people and dogs is undertaken here, and theories in treatment of PLE are presented.