JAAHA Case Report of the Month—A Fluid Situation

Fluids are drugs used in veterinary patients capable of producing beneficial therapeutic or inadvertent harmful effects within the body’s intravascular, interstitial, and intracellular fluid spaces. The individualized design of a fluid therapy plan requires careful patient assessment and targeted selection of proper fluid types, administration routes, and rates, along with adjustments during therapy tailored specifically as per the individual patient’s fluid requirement and therapeutic response.

These new 2024 AAHA Fluid Therapy Guidelines for Dogs and Cats from AAHA are an update to the 2013 version of the guidelines, and feature a new task force and updated information on everything related to fluid therapy. This issue of Trends has several pages devoted to the new guidelines, and you can download and read the full guidelines in the latest issue of JAAHA, available at jaaha.org. You can also access the full guidelines at aaha.org/fluid-therapy.

Photo credit: ©AAHA/Robin Taylor