A Retrospective Study of Intervertebral Disk Disease Confirmed by MRI in Dogs: 89 Cases (2012-2015)

Intervertebral disk disease is a common neurological disease in dogs. In veterinary neurology clinics, the incidence of intervertebral disk disease and the spinal cord compression rate of the disk are well documented. However, the direction of herniation of the intervertebral disk is relatively less known on Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Therefore, this study systematically investigated and analyzed the intervertebral disk disease in dogs. Especially, classification according to the direction of herniation of the disk, the degree of pre - treatment neurological manifestation, and the compression rate was investigated. In addition, the treatment methods of patients who received treatment after visiting the Chonbuk animal medical center (CAMC) were divided into pharmacological treatment and surgical treatment. The location of intervertebral disc in spinal canal was mainly ventral (69.9%), and when the prognosis was evaluated according to the compression rate of the spinal cord, the prognosis of the surgical treatment (72.7%) was more effective than the non - surgical medication (40.6%). Surgical treatment (83.3%) was more successful than nonsurgical medication (60%), especially in cases of severe spinal cord compression (> 50%). In this study, surgical treatment was more effective when the neurological symptoms were severe or the spinal cord compression rate was high.