Correspondence between obesity and hyperlipidemia in dogs/ Correspondencia entre obesidade e hiperlipidemia em caes

The harmful effects of obesity on dog health are quite mentioned in the literature, but little investigated. The term hyperlipidemia refers to the increase of lipid and/or fat concentration (cholesterol, triglycerides or both) in serum. These disorders are relatively common in dogs and may happen as a result of a primary defect in metabolism of lipoproteins or as a consequence of a subjacent systemic disease. The aim of this study was to evaluate the frequency of obese dogs that present alterations on cholesterol and triglycerides serum concentration, and to study the correlation of these disorders with obesity degree, sex, age and castration. Thirty obese dogs with body condition score (BCS) equal or superior to 8 (on a scale between one to nine, and nine representing severe obesity) and a control group of ten dogs with BCS 5 were included. Animals with BCS 9 (n=21 dogs) presented a frequency of 52.4% (n=11 dogs) of hypercholesterolemia and 33.3% (n=7) of hypertriglyceridemia. Dogs with BCS 8 (n=9) presented a frequency of 22,2% (n=2) of hypercholesterolemia and 33,3% (n=3) of hypertriglyceridemia. These alterations also presented correspondence with female sex, age between 4 and 7 years and castration. However, the cholesterol and triglycerides increases were moderate, and not remained within the range of recognized health risk.