The use of deep oral swabs as a surrogate for transoral tracheal wash to obtain bacterial cultures in dogs with pneumonia

Objective - To determine agreement in bacterial culture and susceptibility (BC&S) between deep oral swab (DOS) and routine transoral tracheal wash (TOTW) in dogs with pneumonia. Design - Prospective study, performed between 2008 and 2010 with no follow-up period. Setting - University teaching hospital. Animals - Five puppies and 5 adult dogs with community or hospital-acquired pneumonia. Measurements and Main Results - A DOS was collected from each patient; dogs were then briefly anesthetized with propofol(a) for a routine TOTW. Routine microbiology techniques were used for culture. Positive culture results were obtained from all 20 swabs. Results of BC&S were compared between the 2 sites. In all puppies, there was no agreement between DOS and TOTW. In adult dogs, 2 patients with hospital-acquired infection (HAI) had complete agreement between the BC&S results from DOS and TOTW. Two adult dogs had some similarity in BC&S results, and the final dog had no relationship between cultures. Conclusions - DOS is not an appropriate alternative to TOTW to obtain samples for BC&S in puppies with pneumonia. In adult dogs, traditional TOTW remains the gold standard, but DOS may be considered in dogs with suspected HAI. Further work is needed to confirm this preliminary finding.