This project, ‘Pattern of thyroid function tests during recovery from acute nonthyroidal illness’, was eligible to begin case enrollment in January 2020.
To date, no cases have been enrolled. Two cases have been screened for possible eligibility; however, both had total T4 results within reference interval and were not eligible. The reasons thus far for the difficulty in case enrollment are two-fold: first, the inclusion criteria were rather strict, therefore, we are relaxing our inclusion criteria approved by the University’s Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee. Any dog undergoing anesthesia and/or surgery for treatment of a recoverable disease (gastrointestinal FB, gallbladder removal, fracture, GDV, etc.) will be eligible for inclusion so long as it fulfills the other inclusion criteria outlined in the funded grant. Second, our teaching hospital, starting middle of March 2020, largely shutdown due to the COVID19 pandemic. Our caseload dropped to 10-20% of normal, thus we were only able to attempt case enrollment for 2.5 months.
It is our expectation that with the hospital returning to normal function and relaxation of the inclusion criteria, case enrollment will improve. To allow for sufficient time to obtain the desired number of cases (25), the project timeline has been extended.
Mid-Year-1 Research Update Dr. Bolton regarding thyroid testing.
