RESEARCH ARTICLE Characterisation of Brachycephalic Obstructive Airway Syndrome in French Bulldogs Using Whole-Body Barometric

Brachycephalic obstructive airway syndrome (BOAS) is an important health and welfare problem in several popular dog breeds. Whole-body barometric plethysmography (WBBP) is a non-invasive method that allows safe and repeated quantitative measurements of respi-ratory cycles on unsedated dogs. Here respiratory flow traces in French bulldogs from the pet population were characterised usingWBBP, and a computational application was devel-oped to recognise affected animals. Eighty-nine French bulldogs and twenty non-brachyce-phalic controls underwent WBBP testing. A respiratory functional grading system was used on each dog based on respiratory signs (i.e. respiratory noise, effort, etc.) before and after exercise. For development of an objective BOAS classifier, functional Grades 0 and I were considered to have insignificant clinical signs (termed here BOAS-) and Grades II and III to have significant signs (termed here BOAS+). A comparison between owner-perception of BOAS and functional grading revealed that 60 % of owners failed to recognise BOAS in dogs that graded BOAS+ in this study.WBBP flow traces were found to be significantly differ-ent between non-brachycephalic controls and Grade 0 French bulldogs; BOAS- and BOAS