CASE REPORT article
Front. Vet. Sci.
Sec. Anesthesiology and Animal Pain Management
Volume 12 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fvets.2025.1654764
This article is part of the Research TopicCardiac anaesthesia in veterinary medicine: recent advances and innovationView all articles
Atropine-Induced Delirium in a Dog
Provisionally accepted
- School of Veterinary Medicine, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, United States
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A 6-year-old, female, spayed, goldendoodle was presented as a referral for bradycardia and collapse. An electrocardiogram revealed a high-grade second-degree atrioventricular block (HG2AVB) with atrial flutter. The patient was hospitalized overnight with the intention of pacemaker placement the following morning. Following bolus administration of atropine and lidocaine to rule out high vagal tone, the patient was placed on an atropine continuous rate infusion (CRI) to increase heart rate overnight. This resulted in an acute onset of suspected delirium, which lasted several hours following cessation of the CRI. The patient proceeded with pacemaker placement the following day. No further neurological events have been noted at one-year post pacemaker placement. Atropine-associated delirium should be considered in any patient where high cumulative doses of atropine are being considered.
Keywords: canine, continuous rate infusion, psychosis, Anticholinergic, Cardiac, Atrioventricularblock
Received: 26 Jun 2025; Accepted: 08 Sep 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Fedotova, Kellihan, Smith and Bartholomew. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Heidi Britt Kellihan, heidi.kellihan@wisc.edu
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