Efficacy of Intravenous Administration of Combined Acid Suppressants in Healthy Dogs

Background: Short-term intravenous co-administration of famotidine and pantoprazole is used by some veterinarians to treat gastrointestinal bleeding in critically ill dogs. However, clinical studies have not evaluated the efficacy of combination acid suppressant treatment in dogs. Hypothesis/Objectives: To compare the effect of intravenous co-administration of famotidine and pantoprazole to mono-therapy with pantoprazole on intragastric pH in dogs. We hypothesized that single agent pantoprazole would be more effec-tive than combination with famotidine. Animals: Twelve healthy adult colony dogs. Methods: Randomized, 2-way crossover design. All dogs received placebo (0.9 % saline) for 24 hours followed by 1.0 mg/ kg IV q12h pantoprazole or combination treatment with famotidine and pantoprazole for 3 consecutive days. Intragastric pH monitoring was used to continuously record intragastric pH for 96 hours beginning on day 0 of treatment. Mean percent-age time (MPT) that intragastric pH was ≥3 and ≥4 were compared between groups using ANOVA with a posthoc Tukey-Kramer test (a = 0.017). Results: The MPT standard deviation intragastric pH was greater than ≥3 and 4 were 79 17 % and 68 17 % for pantoprazole and 74 19 % and 64 23 % for combination treatment, respectively. There were no significant differences in MPT intragastric pH was ≥3 and 4 between groups. Pantoprazole administered alone achieved pH goals established fo