THE SCINTIGRAPHIC EVALUATION OF SOLID-PHASE GASTRIC-EMPTYING IN NORMAL CATS

The gastric emptying half-time of solid food in normal cats was determ ined using a scintigraphic technique. Tc-99m-sulfur colloid was applie d to dry food. Sequential images were acquired post prandial, and the gastric emptying half-time was determined for several different acquis ition and processing parameters. Good correlation was found between di fferent acquisition and processing methods, some of which made use of edge detection applications, while others used different views, or num ber of views from which the gastric emptying half-time was calculated. The mean +/- standard deviation, (range) and median of the gastric em ptying half-time determined using the geometric mean of total counts i n hand drawn regions of interest from the lateral and ventral images w ere 2.47 +/- 0.71, (1.42-3.61) and 2.37 hours respectably.