Lanreotide and Cabergoline treatment of Dogs with Cushing’s Disease

Abstract

Transsphenoidal selective adenomectomy is the first choice of treatment in humans with Cushing’s disease (CD), even though recurrences are frequent. Therefore, it is important to find an effective and safe medical treatment for CD. Demonstration of expression of somatostatin and dopamine receptors on corticotroph adenomas of humans offers the possibility for medical treatment of CD with somatostatin analogues and dopamine agonists. Because CD has a higher prevalence rate in dogs than in humans, research has been conducted on canine corticotroph adenoma tissue to look for similarities between humans and dogs. The results from this previous study revealed that canine corticotroph adenomas obtained after hypophysectomy provided an interesting model to study corticotroph cell physiology in vitro. In current study research has been conducted to see if dogs can be a suitable animal model in vivo for the medical treatment options of CD in human. Five dogs were treated with lanreotide autogel for six months. One of these dogs also received Cabergoline for three months. Results showed that UCCR decreased after one month of treatment. One dog showed a decrease of plasma ACTH after six months of treatment with lanreotide. CT-scans showed an inhibition in tumor growth in Dog 1, 2 and 4 (Dog 5 has not yet finished the treatment period). In conclusion, lanreotide showed effects on UCCR, plasma hormones and tumor growth. The results until now were not statistically significant; however, the sample size until now was very small. Therefore, most probably, the results will be significant when an additional five dogs are included in the study.