Pneumonia is one of the most common causes of acute lung injury in dogs. Severe cases require hospitalization with oxygen supplementation in addition to other therapies, which generally cost $2,000-4,000. Despite advances in veterinary medicine, treatment for pneumonia is still largely supportive, including broad-spectrum antibiotics, supplemental oxygen, and fluids as needed. Treatments to directly mitigate or reverse lung injury are lacking, and the mortality for severe pneumonia in dogs remains relatively high at 20-30%. Official reports are lacking, but this number can be even higher when including dogs euthanized due to financial limitations.
Irish Wolfhounds are one of the most affected dog breeds affected by pneumonia with about 1/3 of Irish Wolfhounds experiencing at least one episode of pneumonia by age 5 and most of these experiencing recurrent episodes of pneumonia. The exact cause for this predisposition is not known but dysfunction of the bronchi, larynx, and esophagus have been implicated. Recurrent and severe pneumonia is one of the most common causes of death in this breed.
In hopes of providing more direct treatment for pneumonia, the University of Florida College of Veterinary Medicine is currently enrolling dogs in the RESTORED clinical trial (Response and Efficacy of Stem cell Therapy on Oxygen Responsive pneumonia in Dogs). The goal of this clinical trial is to establish the benefit of stem cell administration in dogs suffering from pneumonia as stem cells have been shown to have profound benefits in improving lung function and survival in previous mice, sheep, and human pneumonia studies. Stems cells have the potential to create an anti-inflammatory, reparative microenvironment while also enhancing clearance of bacteria, fluid, and scar tissue in the lungs. This treatment may prove especially useful for predisposed breeds such as Irish Wolfhounds and is hypothesized to lead to faster weaning out of oxygen, shorter time to discharge, and increased survival compared to the current standard of care. To this end, the RESTORED team has been awarded a $54,000 grant from the Irish Wolfhound Foundation to support this clinical trial.
Overall, this study aims to demonstrate that the intravenous administration of mesenchymal stem cells in pet dogs with oxygen-dependent pneumonia significantly alters their systemic and local inflammatory status, shifting from a pro-inflammatory to an anti-inflammatory profile. This will be assessed by measuring multiple blood biomarkers identified as key indicators of inflammation, anti-inflammation, and cellular damage. The study will incorporate validated laboratory tests, a critical illness scoring system, gold-standard oxygenation parameters, and highly sensitive imaging diagnostics.
This project is a collaboration between the Department of Physiological Sciences (Dr. Helena Zomer, responsible for obtaining and ensuring the quality of the stem cells isolated from the adipose tissue of young, healthy dogs) and the Department of Small Animal Clinical Sciences (Dr. Ronald Goncalves, from the Emergency and Critical Care service, which receive and treat pneumonia patients). The team also includes Dr. Corey Fisher, ECC resident, staff (Oscar Hernandez Maldonado), graduate students from both departments (Gabriel Casanova and Jessica Novais) and DVM student (Luis Parera.)
