Calf mortality constitutes a substantial loss for agriculture economy-based countries and is also a significant herd problem in developed countries. However, the occurrence and frequency of responsible gastro-intestinal (GI) pathogens in severe newborn diarrhea is still not well known. We aimed to determine the seasonal and age-associated pathogen distribution of severe diarrhea in newborn calves admitted to the intensive care unit (ICU) of Erciyes University animal hospital over a year. Fecal samples were collected during the ICU admissions, and specimens were subjected to a diarrheal pathogen screening panel that included bovine coronavirus (BCoV), Cryptosporidium spp., ETEC K99+, and bovine rotavirus, using RT-PCR and conventional PCR methods. Further isolation experiments were performed with permissive cell cultures and bacterial enrichment methods to identify the clinical importance of infectious pathogen shedding in the ICU. Among the hospitalized calves aged less than 45 days old, the majority of calves originated from small farms (85.9%). The pathogen that most frequently occurred was Cryptosporidium spp. (61.5%) followed by rotavirus (56.4%). The frequency of animal admission to ICU and GI pathogen identification was higher during the winter season (44.9%) when compared to other seasons. Most calves included in the study were 1–6 days old (44.9%). Lastly, co-infection with rotavirus and Cryptosporidium spp. occurred more frequently than other dual or multi-infection events. This study was the first to define severe diarrhea—causing GI pathogens from ICU admitted newborn calves in Turkey.

Rhodococcus equi (R. equi), a gram-positive facultative intracellular pathogen, is a common cause of pneumonia in foals and represents a major cause of disease and death. The aim of the present study was to investigate the time-depended changes in White Blood Cells (WBC), basophils (Baso), neutrophils (Neu), lymphocytes (Lymf), monocytes (Mon), eosinophils (Eos), platelet (PLT) counts, fibrinogen (Fbg) concentration, interferon (IFN-α, IFN-γ) and interleukins (IL-2 and IL-10) in foals with clinical R. equi pneumonia. The main treatment was with azithromycin-rifampicin for 14 days. Blood was sampled prior to, 7 and 14 days after starting therapy. Treatment was associated with significantly decreased counts of WBC, (25.6 ± 6.7 and 14.2 ± 2,7×10³/mL), Neu (18.6 ±6.2 and 10.7 ± 3.1×10³/ml), Mon (1.5 ± 0.5 and 0.9 ±0.2×10³/ml) and Fbg (539±124 and 287 ± 26 g/dl) between day 0 and day 14. IL-2 and IL-10 concentrations were significantly increased (P=0.028, P=0.013, respectively) after treatment, whereas IFN-α and IFN-γ concentrations were not. The diagnostic potentials of INF-α, INF-γ, IL-2 and IL-10 per se seems not very high, however, the study suggests that the activity change of selected interleukins in the course of the disease may be associated with amelioration. We concluded that patterns of serum concentration changes of INF-α, INF-γ, IL-2 and IL-10 may help in the study of the innate immune response in foals during infection and treatment of R. equi pneumonia.

Ekinci G, et al. J Vet Sci. 2024 May;25(3):e38. https://doi.org/10.4142/jvs.23155

Bu çalışma, Kayseri ve civar illerindeki çiftliklerden 01 Ağustos 2019 ve 31 Ağustos 2021 tarihleri arasında, Erciyes Üniversitesi, Veteriner Fakültesi, Eğitim Araştırma ve Uygulama Hastanesi’ne getirilen neonatal ishalli buzağılarda BRV, BCoV, E. coli K99+, Cryptosporidium spp. ve Giardia spp.’nin görülme oranlarını belirlemeyi amaçlayan retros-pektif bir araştırmadır. Belirtilen periyotlar arasında, hastaneye toplamda 1839 buzağı getirildiği tespit edildi. Bu buzağı-lardan 863’ünün İç Hastalıkları Anabilim Dalı Ruminant Kliniğine getirildiği ve bunlardan 560’ının (%65) klinik ishal belir-tisine sahip olduğu belirlendi. İshalli buzağılardan alınan dışkı örneklerinden, tek bir enteropatojen olarak en çok, BCoV (%21.7), sonra sırasıyla; Cryptosporidium spp. (%18.3), ETEC K99+ (F5) (%14.3), BRV (%11.4), Giardia spp. (%0.6) tespit edildiği belirlendi. Birden fazla enteropatojen olarak ise en çok, Cryptosporidium spp. + BRV (8.0%), sonra sıra-sıyla; BRV + BCoV (%7.4), Cryptosporidium spp. + BCoV (%6.3), BRV + ETEC K99+ (%1.1), BRV + BCoV + Cryptos-poridium spp. (%2.3) teşhisi konulduğu gözlendi. 1-7 günlük neonatal ishalli buzağılarda en çok ETEC K99+ (%34.7), 8-14 günlük neonatal ishalli buzağılarda ise en çok Cryptosporidium spp. (%23.9) kaynaklı ishal vakalarının görüldüğü belirlendi. İlkbahar ve kış mevsiminde, en çok BCoV (sırasıyla, %22.5, %25.5), yaz ve sonbahar mevsiminde ise en çok Cryptosporidium spp. (sırasıyla, %26.9, %31.8) kaynaklı ishal teşhisi konulduğu görüldü. Sonuç olarak, 2019-2021 yılları arasında, Kayseri ve civar illerinden Erciyes Üniversitesi, Veteriner Fakültesi, Eğitim Araştırma ve Uygulama Hastanesi’ne getirilen neonatal ishalli buzağılarda, en çok BCoV kaynaklı buzağı ishallerinin görüldüğü ortaya konuldu. Enteropatojenlerin prevalansının örnekleme yeri, zamanı, mevsim gibi çeşitli faktörlere bağlı olarak değişebileceği ve bu çalışmadan elde edilen bulguların buzağı ishalinin önlenmesi için gerekli profilaktik ve yönetimsel önlemlerin alınma-sında faydalı olabileceği sonucuna varıldı.

In the present study, antifungal activity of ozonated olive oil (OZO) and ozonated distilled water (ODW) in the treatment of experimentally induced keratitis with C. albicans in rabbits were invest...