Prevalência de obesidade em cães domiciliados no município de Pelotas-RS

Abstract

Obesity is a disease that occurs due to an excess of adipose tissue in the animal's body, with multifactorial characteristics, resulting in a chronic inflammatory process and predisposing the animal to other diseases. This study aimed to estimate the prevalence of canine obesity in household dogs in the municipality of Pelotas, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil, which resulted in the production of a scientific article. For this, owners of 185 dogs were interviewed, through the application of a questionnaire at home. A veterinarian also performed a physical evaluation of all the animals in the study. The questionnaires addressed issues about the owner's and dog's eating habits, the owner/animal relationship, the environment in which they lived, the behavior and general health of the animals. For the statistical analysis, the prevalence estimation analysis, the chi-square test and kappa test were performed. According to the prevalence analyses, in 76 households visited and 185 dogs evaluated, a prevalence of 37.8% of overweight and obese animals was found. The prevalence was higher in castrated animals (70.0%), mixed breed (54.3%), females (52.8%), and 6-10 years old (44.3%). There were slight discrepancies in the BCS given by the evaluator and the BCS given by the owner, which indicates that the owner can visually estimate the body condition of his dogs, but cannot determine whether the body condition is ideal or not, since most of them classified their animal as healthy despite the score. Most of these owners feed their animals with commercial dry food and homemade food, usually in amounts determined by "eyeballing" it. They also tend to show a lack of concern for their dogs' physical condition, which can be attributed to a lack of knowledge about the importance of proper management and the real complications caused by excess weight. Only 18.4% sought veterinary help when they noticed some type of weight gain or weight loss. It is noticeable that the habits of dogs, imposed by their owners, do not take into account good nutrition and the development of healthy eating and management habits. The importance of this study is due to the fact that there are no reports of similar studies with dogs in the city of Pelotas.