TY - JOUR
T1 - Cardiac assessments of bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) in the Northern Gulf of Mexico following exposure to Deepwater Horizon oil
AU - Linnehan, Barbara K.
AU - Gomez, Forrest M.
AU - Huston, Sharon M.
AU - Hsu, Adonia
AU - Takeshita, Ryan
AU - Colegrove, Kathleen M.
AU - Harms, Craig A.
AU - Barratclough, Ashley
AU - Deming, Alissa C.
AU - Rowles, Teri K.
AU - Musser, Whitney B.
AU - Zolman, Eric S.
AU - Wells, Randall S.
AU - Jensen, Eric D.
AU - Schwacke, Lori H.
AU - Smith, Cynthia R.
N1 - Funding Information:
This research was made possible by a grant from The Gulf of Mexico Research Initiative (Award # SA 18-12). https://gulfresearchinitiative. org/ The Alabama Marine Mammal Stranding Network was funded in part through the John H. Prescott Marine Mammal Rescue Assistance Grant Program, National Fish and Wildlife Foundation Gulf Environmental Benefit Fund (#45720), Dauphin Island Sea Lab, Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, and the Alabama Emergency Management Agency. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. The authors thank the NMMF veterinary technicians, animal trainers, and conservation biologists for their support, especially Veronica Cendejas, Jammy Eichman, Ross Martinson, Todd Speakman, Brian Quigley, Brian Balmer, and Brenda Bauer. We thank Mark Xitco for support of Navy dolphin health exams, and US Army veterinary specialists Henry Cao and Anthony Perron for their technical support. We greatly appreciate the efforts of the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program staff, volunteers, and collaborators, especially Deb Fauquier, Jason Allen, Aaron Barleycorn, Kim Bassos-Hull, Elizabeth Berens-McCabe, Katie McHugh, Christina Toms, Reny Tyson-Moore, and Krystan Wilkinson. We thank Jay Sweeney and Bridget Flannery for their assistance with wild dolphin echocardiography, Tres Clarke for his assistance with ECG, and the collaborative fieldwork teams for assisting with free-ranging dolphin health assessments, especially Forrest Townsend, Larry Fulford, and Larry Hansen. We thank the members of the US Marine Mammal Stranding Network that performed postmortem examinations of stranded dolphins, including the Institute for Marine Mammal Studies, Gulf World Marine Park, Emerald Coast Wildlife Refuge, Dauphin Island Sea Lab, Louisiana Department of Fish and Game, Virginia Aquarium and Marine Science Center, University of North Carolina at Wilmington, and Mote Marine Laboratory and Aquarium. We also thank Gretchen Lovewell for assistance with sample acquisition, and Jacqueline Dillard for figure illustration.
Publisher Copyright:
This is an open access article, free of all copyright, and may be freely reproduced, distributed, transmitted, modified, built upon, or otherwise used by anyone for any lawful purpose. The work is made available under the Creative Commons CC0 public domain dedication.
PY - 2021/12
Y1 - 2021/12
N2 - The Deepwater Horizon (DWH) oil spill profoundly impacted the health of bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) in Barataria Bay, LA (BB). To comprehensively assess the cardiac health of dolphins living within the DWH oil spill footprint, techniques for in-water cardiac evaluation were refined with dolphins cared for by the U.S. Navy Marine Mammal Program in 2018 and applied to free-ranging bottlenose dolphins in BB (n = 34) and Sarasota Bay, Florida (SB) (n = 19), a non-oiled reference population. Cardiac auscultation detected systolic murmurs in the majority of dolphins from both sites (88% BB, 89% SB) and echocardiography showed most of the murmurs were innocent flow murmurs attributed to elevated blood flow velocity [1]. Telemetric six-lead electrocardiography detected arrhythmias in BB dolphins (43%) and SB dolphins (31%), all of which were considered low to moderate risk for adverse cardiac events. Echocardiography showed BB dolphins had thinner left ventricular walls, with significant differences in intraventricular septum thickness at the end of diastole (p = 0.002), and left ventricular posterior wall thickness at the end of diastole (p = 0.033). BB dolphins also had smaller left atrial size (p = 0.004), higher prevalence of tricuspid valve prolapse (p = 0.003), higher prevalence of tricuspid valve thickening (p = 0.033), and higher prevalence of aortic valve thickening (p = 0.008). Two dolphins in BB were diagnosed with pulmonary arterial hypertension based on Doppler echocardiography-derived estimates and supporting echocardiographic findings. Histopathology of dolphins who stranded within the DWH oil spill footprint showed a significantly higher prevalence of myocardial fibrosis (p = 0.003), regardless of age, compared to dolphins outside the oil spill footprint. In conclusion, there were substantial cardiac abnormalities identified in BB dolphins which may be related to DWH oil exposure, however, future work is needed to rule out other hypotheses and further elucidate the connection between oil exposure, pulmonary disease, and the observed cardiac abnormalities.
AB - The Deepwater Horizon (DWH) oil spill profoundly impacted the health of bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) in Barataria Bay, LA (BB). To comprehensively assess the cardiac health of dolphins living within the DWH oil spill footprint, techniques for in-water cardiac evaluation were refined with dolphins cared for by the U.S. Navy Marine Mammal Program in 2018 and applied to free-ranging bottlenose dolphins in BB (n = 34) and Sarasota Bay, Florida (SB) (n = 19), a non-oiled reference population. Cardiac auscultation detected systolic murmurs in the majority of dolphins from both sites (88% BB, 89% SB) and echocardiography showed most of the murmurs were innocent flow murmurs attributed to elevated blood flow velocity [1]. Telemetric six-lead electrocardiography detected arrhythmias in BB dolphins (43%) and SB dolphins (31%), all of which were considered low to moderate risk for adverse cardiac events. Echocardiography showed BB dolphins had thinner left ventricular walls, with significant differences in intraventricular septum thickness at the end of diastole (p = 0.002), and left ventricular posterior wall thickness at the end of diastole (p = 0.033). BB dolphins also had smaller left atrial size (p = 0.004), higher prevalence of tricuspid valve prolapse (p = 0.003), higher prevalence of tricuspid valve thickening (p = 0.033), and higher prevalence of aortic valve thickening (p = 0.008). Two dolphins in BB were diagnosed with pulmonary arterial hypertension based on Doppler echocardiography-derived estimates and supporting echocardiographic findings. Histopathology of dolphins who stranded within the DWH oil spill footprint showed a significantly higher prevalence of myocardial fibrosis (p = 0.003), regardless of age, compared to dolphins outside the oil spill footprint. In conclusion, there were substantial cardiac abnormalities identified in BB dolphins which may be related to DWH oil exposure, however, future work is needed to rule out other hypotheses and further elucidate the connection between oil exposure, pulmonary disease, and the observed cardiac abnormalities.
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U2 - 10.1371/journal.pone.0261112
DO - 10.1371/journal.pone.0261112
M3 - Article
C2 - 34905585
AN - SCOPUS:85122057649
SN - 1932-6203
VL - 16
JO - PloS one
JF - PloS one
IS - 12 December
M1 - e0261112
ER -