O uso do Termômetro infravermelho auricular em gatos eutérmicos com otites assintomáticas

Abstract

Body temperature is an important parameter in the clinical examination to identify systemic changes in the patient. New methods of measuring temperature have been studied, aiming at greater accuracy. Several studies have been carried out with dogs, but few have been carried out with cats. This study aims to evaluate the use of an infrared ear thermometer to measure body temperature in domestic cats and to verify the interferenceof the presence of otitis in measuring this temperature. For this, we used the measurement of right ear temperature (RAT), left ear temperature (SAT), and rectal temperature (TR) in 100 cats. In the control group, the felines that did not present otitis the maximum rectal temperature was 39.8°C while the maximums of (TAD) and (TAE) were 40.3 and 40.5°C, respectively; while the minimum was 36.1°C for the 3 different locations. While in the group with otitis, TR ranged from 36.6 to 39.2°C, TAD from 37.3 to 40.2°C and TAE from 37.5 to 40.1°C. Although TAD and TAE differ significantly from TR, ear temperatures showed a strong and positive relationship (p < 0.05) with TR, with rho = 0.7 and 0.75, respectively. Human infrared thermometers were chosen because of their easy availability and frequent use in clinical practice. Despite the temperature of the right and left ears differing significantly from the rectal temperature, the temperature of the ears showed similar results with repeatability, and can be used in the clinical evaluation of cats, as long as reference values are determined.