Veterinary Clinical Medicine-I (General and Systemic)

BLOOD PRESSURE

Arterial blood pressure

• Indirect measurement practicable only in the horse by application of sphygmomanometer to the tail and measurement of pressure in ventral coccygeal artery
• Mean systolic/diastolic pressures in the coccygeal artery in normal horses are 112-77 mm Hg
• Raising or lowering head significantly alters pressure
• Hypertension in horses occurs in
• Epistaxis
• Laminitis
• Painful lower limb fractures
• Intestinal obstruction

Intracardiac blood pressure

• Cardiac catheterization can provide evidence of blood pressure in each of the heart chambers and in the larger vessels.
• Abnormalities can provide conclusive diagnostic information about such disease as congenital cardiac, artial or large vessel defects.
• Largely supplanted by the less hazardous echocardiography