Assessment of healing of wounds through thermography for cats after orchiectomy

Objective: The purpose of this study is to assess the variation of surface temperature in scrotal area in terms of days for cats after orchiectomy operation by using infrared thermography and to determine the effectiveness of this method for the follow up of its postoperative inflammatory reply. Thermography is a method providing opportunity to follow up the surgical recovery process noninvasively and objectively, therefore its potential of use for small animals has been gradually increasing. Materials and Methods: The study material consists of eight healthy male cat were brought to the clinic for elective castration purpose. Starting from Preoperative period, thermal imaging was made during seven postoperative days. Measuring was achieved by FLIR- trademark thermal camera by keeping emissivity value constant under the protection of standard filming and distance and angle. Room temperature (22.33±1.19 °C) and animals’ body temperatures (38.22±0.61 °C) were kept under control, therefore the effect of the environmental variables was minimized. Surface temperatures of right and left scrotal regions were recorded separately and compared to preoperative values. Results: During the survey period no complication developed for the wound line in any case. Average surface temperatures measured in right and left sectoral regions are 29.01±8.57 °C and 29.24±8.65 °C respectively and no statistical meaningful difference was found between two sides. Moreover, no meaningful difference was found between preoperative and postoperative 1.–7. day measuring. (p>0.05). Thermal variation curve displayed a slight drop on the 1. day and a gradual increase during 4.–7. days; however, all these variations occurred within the physiological limits and not meaningful in terms of statistical aspect. Conclusion: Findings obtained reveal that; orchiectomy operation formed inflammatory reply at minimal level for cats and the recovery process was completed without any complication. Capability of thermography to follow up the temperature variations in scrotal area reliably reveals that this method may be used as a mean of complementary diagnosis for the assessment of healing of wounds for small animal surgery.