THE USE OF OZONE THERAPY IN VETERINARY MEDICINE: A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW

Abstract

In the past decades, veterinary medicine has endorsed more alternative medicine practices, among which ozone therapy. Ozone therapy is a therapeutic method associated with integrative medicine by which ozone is administered to an organism in order to treat or ameliorate certain pathologies, however, controversy exists due to the lack of sufficient scientific proof of efficacy. This review aims to gather and summarize the current knowledge about the potential uses of ozone in veterinary medicine. A search in several biomedical databases such as PubMed, Science Direct, Research Gate, Google Scholar, Scopus but also in the archives of dedicated ozone journals, was performed using specific keywords. The results of the literature retrieval (117 papers) were grouped by pathology, affected system, or species in which ozone therapy can be applied or has been studied. Although the number of potential uses for ozone therapy quoted is large, there aren’t enough studies to demonstrate the efficacy of each use. Most articles have positive yet uncertain conclusions, confirming the therapeutic effect of ozone but recommending further studies. The literature mentions clinical improvement after the use of ozone and suggests ozone therapy as an alternative approach to specific pathologies, or as an adjuvant to therapeutic protocols. Almost half of the work published is experimental, on animal models, and among the clinical studies, just a small percentage is related to small animal medicine. The therapeutic array of ozone therapy is yet to be defined.