OBJECTIVES: To describe and quantify systemic glucocorticoid usage in dogs in primary-care veterinary practice in the UK and to numerically rank major suspected adverse reactions (SARs) following therapy.

METHODS: The VetCompass™ database was interrogated from clinical data relating to 455,557 dogs under care in veterinary practices across the UK during 2013. All systemic glucocorticoid pharmacotherapeutics administered or dispensed to dogs during 2013 were identified from the electronic patient records (EPR) and described. In a random sample of 2,110 dogs with dispensing and administering events, the EPR were reviewed in detail for evidence of SARs. A SAR was any unfavourable/unintended observation including side effects recorded in the EPR whether or not considered to be product-related and that occurred within 31 days of first glucocorticoid treatment.

RESULTS: Overall, 28,472 dogs received at least one systemic glucocorticoid during 2013 (6.2% of study dogs, 95%CI 6.2-6.3) with 30,570 oral (60.0% of total) and 20,606 injectable (40% of total) glucocorticoid events. Prednisolone represented the most frequently used oral preparation (27,362 events (90.0%)) and dexamethasone preparations were the most common injectable therapeutic (19,671 events (96.4%)). After detailed review of the EPR from the random selection of 2,110 dogs receiving systemic glucocorticoids, 106 dogs (5.0%, 95% CI 4.1-6.0%) had a total of 169 SARs recorded. The most frequent of these were polydipsia (38 events, 22.5%), polyuria (27, 16.0%), vomiting (19, 11.2%), diarrhoea (16, 9.5%) and polyphagia (15, 8.9%). In 34 (20.1%) of these events the dose of the glucocorticoid was subsequently reduced whilst in 15 (8.9%) the therapy was discontinued.

CONCLUSIONS: Systemic glucocorticoid therapy was a frequent treatment in dogs attending primary-care practice, with a clinically relevant minority experiencing at least one SAR. This is a conservative quantification as only the SARS that were reported or identified by the veterinarian were included in the study.