PetSavers reports and interviews

   Valeria Bergomi investigated the islet microenvironment in canine and feline diabetes mellitus as a BSAVA PetSaversfunded Master’s Degree by Research at the University of Cambridge under the supervision of Kate Hughes, and with support from Lucy Davison. Read on to find out what their research revealed.

 Alexander Davies undertook a BSAVA PetSavers student research project (SRP) entitled Feline lymphoma of the nervous system: a retrospective study (2003–2018) at the Royal Veterinary College under the supervision of Elsa Beltran.

 Tim Williams has been awarded several PetSavers grants, including clinical research projects and student projects. His most recent is for an undergraduate project entitled ‘Can we use bacterial outer membrane vesicles as a novel antibacterial therapy?’

 Aarti Kathrani is currently working on the PetSavers-funded study ‘Defining the duodenal mycobiota in dogs with chronic enteropathy’. She has also just been awarded a new PetSavers clinical research project grant for a study entitled ‘The characterization and clinical significance of intestinal fibrosis in cats with chronic inflammatory enteropathy’.

 Oliver Garden, the Henry and Corinne R Bower Professor of Medicine and Chair of the Department of Clinical Sciences & Advanced Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania (Penn Vet), has received three PetSavers’ grants – two as the supervisor of undergraduate students and one as the co-applicant of a clinical research project with Dr Barbara Glanemann investigating single versus split-dose regimens of prednisolone in treating immune-mediated haemolytic anaemia in dogs.

 Dave Dickson, a veterinary cardiologist at HeartVets, gives an insight into his life in the PetSavers’ series of Meet the researcher.

  Next in the PetSavers’ series of interviews is Dr Conor O’Halloran who currently works at a small animal veterinary practice in Edinburgh.

 Andrew Foster and collaborators Nicola Ho, Sandra Sanchis-Mora, Jaime Viscasillas and Ludovic Pelligand, from the Royal Veterinary College, have been awarded PetSavers funding to explore the potential of the use of a wireless, smartphone/tablet-compatible ultrasound probe for the provision of locoregional anaesthesia in dogs.

  Liz Bode, together with collaborators David Singleton and Hannah Hodgkiss-Geere from the University of Liverpool and Melanie Hezzell from the University of Bristol, has been awarded joint PetSavers and Veterinary Cardiovascular Society funding to investigate the use of pimobendan in primary veterinary practice in the United Kingdom. Data will be collated from the Small Animal Surveillance Network (SAVSNET), of which David is a key member. Liz, Hannah and Melanie bring cardiovascular specialism to the team and Melanie has previous experience of collating N-terminal pro B-type natriuretic peptide (NT-proBNP) data from SAVSNET.

 Rita Gonçalves, Head of the Neurology and Neurosurgery service at Liverpool University, and her team were recipients of a PetSavers research grant. This article highlights the research findings in their recently published JSAP article entitled ‘Preliminary investigation of serum cardiac troponin I in dogs with acute ischaemic stroke’.