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Diagnosis | Self-mutilation after intramuscular ketamine-related neuronal injury

Lab Animal volume 40, pages 214–216 (2011)Cite this article

We reviewed the procedures that had been done on the rabbits before their clinical presentations. Researchers had administered ketamine and xylazine into the muscles of the right caudolateral thigh, not the right lower lumbar muscles, as stated in their protocol. The appearance of the rabbits was consistent with reports describing self-mutilation after ketamine administration into the caudal thigh muscles of rabbits1,2, rats3 and guinea pigs4 and with two reports of self-mutilation after i.m. administration of Innovar-Vet (fentanyl and droperidol) in guinea pigs5,6. Ketamine was given with xylazine1,3, acepromazine4 or both drugs2. The self-mutilating behavior ranged from nibbling at the toenails, similar to that observed in the first rabbit in this report, to biting off the soft tissues and bones of the phalanges, usually beginning with the medial or lateral digits, similar to that observed in the second rabbit of this report.

Most of the reports describing self-mutilation also found damage to the sciatic nerve in the animals1,2,3. In one report1, the affected sciatic nerves were grossly thickened and microscopically showed axonal degeneration with swelling, breakdown and interruption of axons and ballooning and segmentation of the myelin sheath. The affected rabbits also began chewing at their digits 2–4 days after injection of ketamine (50 mg per kg body weight) and xylazine (10 mg per kg body weight), a similar time frame to that of the occurrence of clinical signs in the first rabbit in our facility. Other reports describe self-mutilation in rabbits and rats appearing up to 7 and 14 days after anesthetic injection2,3. In one of these reports2, axonal degeneration was noted in the sciatic nerves of four self-mutilating rabbits that had been injected with ketamine (30 mg per kg body weight), xylazine (10 mg per kg body weight) and acepromazine (1 mg per kg body weight) in the caudal thigh muscles. The sciatic nerves were grossly enlarged and microscopically showed edema, perineuritis and vacuolization.

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Figure 4: Photomicrograph of a longitudinal section of sciatic nerve from the rabbit shown in Figure 1.
Figure 5: Photomicrograph of a longitudinal section of sciatic nerve from the rabbit shown in Figure 1.
Figure 6: Photomicrograph of a cross section of tibial nerve from the rabbit shown in Figure 1.

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Diagnosis | Self-mutilation after intramuscular ketamine-related neuronal injury. Lab Anim 40, 214–216 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1038/laban0711-214

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