Editorial: Pathologic Findings in Stranded Marine Mammals: A Global Perspective

With the publications of the third edition of the CRC Handbook of Marine Mammal Medicine and Pathology of Wildlife and Zoo Animals in 2018, Greg wanted to be especially vigilant about securing manuscripts describing more recent and novel disease entities which may not have been captured in either textbook and extended invitations to people and stranding response programs that historically may have been underrepresented in the marine mammal stranding and pathology literature. [...]marine mammal clinical pathology parameters are increasingly documented and validated from both stranded marine mammals and free-ranging marine mammal health assessments and their values and reference ranges are being incorporated into formulating prognoses, informing treatments and deciding disposition of rehab animals (Ewing et al.). The target species comprised 19 cetaceans including 13 papers describing findings in multiple species and 6 studies which detailed findings in individual species, focusing on beluga, rough toothed dolphins, harbor porpoises, bottlenose dolphins, gray whales and a Bryde's whale. Reviews are presented on case series of aggression by conspecifics, differentials for infectious meningoencephalitis, harbor porpoise specific pathologic findings, the effects of acute entrapment, and models of decompression sickness.