Asthma affects nearly 5 percent of cats and can be difficult to diagnose. The gold standard has been to sample airways, but this requires anesthesia, posing some risk to patients and delaying therapy in some cases.
A new, non-invasive tool may hasten identification of asthma and potentially prevent attacks. University of Missouri researchers collected exhaled breath condensate (EBC) from cats who exhaled into a cooling device — much like the test for alcohol concentration in humans.
The researchers, with a grant from the Morris Animal Foundation, collected EBC from cats with signs of asthma and compared it to condensate from cats without the disease. They found differing components between the samples that may help identify cats with asthma.
For more information on the disease please see “Respiratory Issues” at the Cornell Feline Health Center.
