2022 article
What Is Your Diagnosis?
Tucker, S., Archibald, K., Cohen, E. B., Sommer, S., Keene, B. W., Minter, L. J., & Delk, K. W. (2021, December). JOURNAL OF AVIAN MEDICINE AND SURGERY, Vol. 35, pp. 486–493.
TL;DR:
A captive 38-year-old female Chilean flamingo presented with an approximately 4-day history of being listless and moving slowly behind the flock and severe dilation of the left ventricle and decreased cardiac systolic function, which prompted diagnostic imaging and medical management of the cardiac abnormalities.
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(Web of Science)
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Added: February 21, 2022
A captive 38-year-old female Chilean flamingo (Phoenicopterus chilensis) presented with an approximately 4-day history of being listless and moving slowly behind the flock. The flamingo had been housed at the North Carolina Zoo (Asheboro, NC, USA) for the previous 28 years. This bird’s medical history included mild intermittent lameness associated with pododermatitis and a cloacal papilloma diagnosed via biopsy 9 years earlier. The flamingo habitat at the North Carolina Zoo covers approximately 12.23 15.2 m with a 3.2 3 5.6-m indoor holding area. The mixed sex (9:8 ratio) flock of 17 flamingoes are fed a diet consisting of Mazuri Flamingo Complete pellets (Mazuri Exotic Animal Nutrition, St Louis, MO, USA). On presentation, the flamingo weighed 1.85 kg (historical weight 2–2.4 kg), with a body condition score (BCS) of 1.5/5. Tachycardia was auscultated and later confirmed by electrocardiogram (ECG) to be a ventricular tachycardia of approximately 400 beats per minute (Fig 1). Complete blood count revealed a monocytosis (31%; reference range, 0.0%–7.8%) with a total white blood cell count of 22 610 cells/lL (reference range, 2900– 20 000 cells/lL). An echocardiogram (SonoSite M-Turbo, Bothell, WA, USA) performed with a C11X (8–5-MHz transducer) semilinear probe revealed severe dilation of the left ventricle and decreased cardiac systolic function (fractional shortening 18.3% compared with 81.5% in an ageand sex-matched clinically normal flamingo) (Fig 2A through D). Comparison ECG and echocardiographic findings were obtained on a sex-matched 32-year-old female Chilean flamingo from the same flock. This apparently healthy younger bird had a heart rate of 200 beats per minute with sinus rhythm, more robust systolic left ventricular function, and no cardiac chamber dilation. Further diagnostic imaging and medical management of the cardiac abnormalities were discussed.