C.B. Cardoso1; S.C. Rahal1; F.S. Agostinho1; E.S. Filho2; M.J. Mamprim3; R.R. Santos1; F.O.B. Monteiro2
The aim of this study was to retrospectively assess a population of cats with long-bone fractures over an eight-year period. Cat signalment (breed, sex, age, body weight); domiciliary status; cause of injury; time of occurrence; injured limbs and fractured bones (humerus, radius/ulna, femur, tibia/fibula); soft-tissue damage (closed, open); and fracture location (proximal, middle or distal third), direction of the fracture line in relation to the bone's longitudinal axis (transverse, oblique, spiral) and extent of damage (incomplete, complete, multi-fragmentary) were evaluated. To compare the variable proportions, the G-test was used while assuming that the proportions in each category were equal. The differences were considered significant at p < 0.05. A total of 188 cats were evaluated, 89.33% were crossbred, 5.85% Siamese, and 4.78% Persian. Among the cats, aged from six to 180 months, 60.63% were up to 12 months old. The body weight was greater than or equal to 2.0 kg in 68.08% of the cases. Motor vehicle accidents accounted for 40.95% of the causes, followed by dog bites (9.04%), falls (4.78%), and accidents in general (5.31%). The femur was the most affected bone (53.81%), followed by the tibia/fibula (28.38%), radius/ulna (9.74%), and humerus (8.05%). The closed fractures (84.74%) were more frequent than open ones (11.44%). In conclusion, this population was constituted mainly of domiciled crossbred cats, 12 months of age or younger, weighing at least 2 kg, that had been most frequently affected by complete closed fractures of the femur due to a traffic-related accident.