HYPERTROPHIC OSTEOPATHY (Marie's disease), was not my first thought when my patient presented with swelling of the distal limbs, severe lameness, lethargy and fever.
I jumped to infection but I'm learning hopping on the first diagnosis is a bad idea. I realised the discomfort and swelling was focused in regions surrounding the long bones. The woollen areas were hot to the touch and indicated that an inflammatory process was going on. The blood smear was unremarkable.
We decided that the next step would be rads as one of the clinicians has a suspicion about Marie's disease.
We found significant periosteal proliferation of the long bones as well as a large opacity in the thorax which fit the preliminary diagnosis.
Marie's disease is a diffuse periosteal proliferative condition of long bones in dogs secondary to neoplastic or infectious masses in the thoracic or abdominal cavity. Paraneoplastic syndrome for the win!
(https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/veterinary-science-and-veterinary-medicine/Hypertrophic-osteopathy)
A diagnosis I shan't forget in a hurry.
