The study of diseases in horses encompasses a wide range of conditions affecting equine health, including infectious diseases, metabolic disorders, and genetic abnormalities. These diseases can impact various systems within the horse, such as respiratory, gastrointestinal, and musculoskeletal systems, and can lead to significant health challenges. Research in this area focuses on understanding the pathophysiology, diagnosis, prevention, and treatment of equine diseases. Common diseases studied include equine influenza, equine herpesvirus, and laminitis. This page provides access to peer-reviewed research studies and scholarly articles that explore the etiology, clinical presentation, and management strategies of diseases in horses, contributing to the advancement of equine veterinary medicine.
Laroucau K, Lucia de Assis Santana V, Girault G, Martin B, Miranda da Silveira PP, Brasil Machado M, Joseph M, Wernery R, Wernery U, Zientara S....We present the first molecular characterisation based on MLVA and SNP analysis of a strain of Burkholderia mallei isolated from a mule found dead in Brazil in 2016.
Zolfaghari Emameh R, Purmonen S, Sukura A, Parkkila S.Foodborne parasites are a source of human parasitic infection. Zoonotic infections of humans arise from a variety of domestic and wild animals, including sheep, goats, cattle, camels, horses, pigs, boars, bears, felines, canids, amphibians, reptiles, poultry, and aquatic animals such as fishes and shrimp. Therefore, the implementation of efficient, accessible, and controllable inspection policies for livestock, fisheries, slaughterhouses, and meat processing and packaging companies is highly recommended. In addition, more attention should be paid to the education of auditors from the quality c...
Martel G, Crowley D, Olive J, Halley J, Laverty S.Extensive osteochondritis dissecans (OCD) lesions of the lateral ridge of the trochlea of the femur (LRTF), the most common OCD-affected site in the stifle, have a poor outcome with surgical debridement and can be career ending. The early detection of osteochondrosis lesions and their conservative management holds the promise to enhance outcome. We hypothesise that ultrasonography is a valuable field screening tool to detect and monitor early subclinical LRTF osteochondrosis. Objective: The goals were to 1) describe the normal ultrasonographic features of the LRTF in foals of different ages an...
Molento MB, Canever RJ.Cyathostomins are the most prevalent nematodes of horses, and multidrug resistance has been reported worldwide. There is a need to implement alternative drug monitoring analytical tests. The objective of this study was to determine the consistency (5 repetitions) of the larval migration on agar test (LMAT) using ivermectin, moxidectin, pyrantel or albendazole against cyathostomin infective-stage larvae in eight different concentrations. LMAT showed a strong coefficient of determination (R2 > 0.91), between the test repetitions (n=5). The average 50% effective concentration (EC50) for iverme...
Estell K.Periocular neoplasia is common in horses. Treatment of the periocular skin and ocular adnexal structures can be technically challenging. Common neoplastic conditions, a treatment algorithm, surgical principles, and therapeutic modalities are reviewed. Regardless of the type of neoplasia found or the treatment that is applied, success is most likely when the neoplastic tumor is small.
Townsend WM.Examination of the lens is critical, particularly when evaluating horses with visual impairment or performing prepurchase examinations. To adequately evaluate the lens, the pupil must be pharmacologically dilated. A cataract is any lens opacity. The size, density, and position of a cataract determine the impact on vision. Cataracts may be congenital or inherited or occur secondary to trauma or equine recurrent uveitis. Surgical removal is the only treatment option for vision impairing cataracts, but careful selection of surgical candidates is critical for successful outcomes.
Skive B, Rohde M, Molinari G, Braunstein TH, Bojesen AM. subsp. () is an opportunistic pathogen of several species including humans. is found on mucus membranes of healthy horses, but can cause acute and chronic endometritis. Recently was found able to reside in the endometrium for prolonged periods of time. Thus, we hypothesized that an intracellular phase may be part of the pathogenesis and investigated if was able to invade and survive inside epithelial cells. HEp-2 and HeLa cell lines were co-cultured with two strains (1-4a and S31A1) both originating from the uterus of mares suffering from endometritis. Cells were fixed at different time...
Lee Y, Kiupel M, Soboll Hussey G.Dendritic cells (DCs) are professional antigen-presenting cells that have multiple subpopulations with different phenotypes and immune functions. Previous research demonstrated that DCs have strong potential for anti-viral defense in the host. However, viruses including alphaherpesvirinae have developed strategies to interfere with the function or maturation of DCs, causing immune dysfunction and avoidance of pathogen elimination. The goal of the present study was to isolate and characterize equine lung-derived DCs (L-DCs) for use in studies of respiratory viruses and compare their features wi...
Parente EJ.Recurrent laryngeal neuropathy appears to be a simple problem that should have a simple solution, yet the complexity and dynamic nature of laryngeal function is underappreciated. This review highlights the challenges and accomplishments that work towards that greater understanding of what is necessary to find a successful solution.
Lu G, Fu C, Huang J, Xu H, Wu P, Ping X, Li S.Equine pegivirus (EPgV) is a newly discovered equine virus, which is taxonomically classified in the Pegivirus genus of the Flaviviridae family. Until now, only the complete genome sequence of the first reported EPgV strain, from the USA (strain name: C0035) is available on online databases. Considering this, horse serum samples were collected from horses in China and screened for EPgV RNA by RT-PCR. One EPgV strain, LW/2016, was obtained and its near-complete genome sequence was acquired by standard PCR. Further analysis of its nucleotide sequence indicates LW/2016 is genetically divergent fr...
Zakrajsek E.A recently purchased 16-year-old Thoroughbred mare with a history of recurrent colic and low body weight, also had lameness in 3 limbs, pain at the sacro-iliac joint, and increased corneal opacity of the right eye. Response to supportive therapy was poor and euthanasia was elected. A postmortem examination and histopathology confirmed cyathostomiasis within the large colon and cecum and chronic anterior uveitis of the right eye. Une jument Thoroughbred, âgée de 16 ans et récemment achetée, avec une anamnèse de coliques récurrentes et de faible poids corporel souffrait aussi de boiterie ...
Beckers KF, Schulz CJ, Childers GW.Advances have been made to standardize 16S rRNA gene amplicon based studies for inter-study comparisons, yet there are many opportunities for systematic error that may render these comparisons improper and misleading. The fecal microbiome of horses has been examined previously, however, no universal horse fecal collection method and sample processing procedure has been established. This study was initialized in large part to ensure that samples collected by different individuals from different geographical areas (i.e., crowdsourced) were not contaminated due to less than optimal sampling or ho...
Mori S, Horita A, Ginnaga A, Miyatsu Y, Sawabe K, Matsumura T, Ato M, Yamamoto A, Shibayama K, Arai S, Yamagishi T, Takahashi M, Taki H, Hifumi T.This is the first report on large-scale experimental production of an equine antivenom against the redback spider (Latrodectus hasseltii) lived in Japan. We captured 10,000 redback spiders in Japan and prepared the toxoids of crude venom extract, mixed the toxoids with a mineral oil adjuvant, and immunized healthy horses repeatedly over a period of several weeks. Thereafter, we separated the horse plasma, purified the γ-globulin fraction, and stocked it as a purified antivenom concentrate. Consequently, we manufactured approximately 6,500 vials of a single-dose freeze-dried test lot from a po...
Piyasena TBH, Setoh YX, Hobson-Peters J, Prow NA, Bielefeldt-Ohmann H, Khromykh AA, Perera D, Cardosa MJ, Kirkland PD, Hall RA.In Australia, infection of horses with the West Nile virus (WNV) or Murray Valley encephalitis virus (MVEV) occasionally results in severe neurological disease that cannot be clinically differentiated. Confirmatory serological tests to detect antibody specific for MVEV or WNV in horses are often hampered by cross-reactive antibodies induced to conserved epitopes on the envelope (E) protein. This study utilized bacterially expressed recombinant antigens derived from domain III of the E protein (rE-DIII) of MVEV and WNV, respectively, to determine whether these subunit antigens provided specific...
Carstensen H, Kjær L, Haugaard MM, Flethøj M, Hesselkilde EZ, Kanters JK, Pehrson S, Buhl R, Jespersen T.Antiarrhythmic compounds against atrial fibrillation (AF) often have reduced efficacy and may display cardiac and/or noncardiac toxicity. Efficacy can be improved by combining 2 compounds with distinct mechanisms, and it may be possible to use lower doses of each compound, thereby reducing the likelihood of adverse side effects. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether the effective doses of dofetilide and ranolazine can be reduced if the drugs are combined. Dofetilide, ranolazine, and a combination of these were administered in 4 incremental dosing regimens to horses with acutely ...
Peachey LE, Pinchbeck GL, Matthews JB, Burden FA, Lespine A, von Samson-Himmelstjerna G, Krücken J, Hodgkinson JE.Anthelmintic resistance is a global problem that threatens sustainable control of the equine gastrointestinal cyathostomins (Phylum Nematoda; Superfamily Strongyloidea). Of the three novel anthelmintic classes that have reached the veterinary market in the last decade, none are currently licenced in horses, hence current control regimens focus on prolonging the useful lifespan of licenced anthelmintics. This approach would be facilitated by knowledge of the resistance mechanisms to the most widely used anthelmintics, the macrocyclic lactones (ML). There are no data regarding resistance mechani...
of surveillance testing, April to June 2017International disease occurrence in the second quarter of 2017These are among matters discussed in the most recent quarterly equine disease surveillance report, prepared by Defra, the Animal Health Trust and the British Equine Veterinary Association.
Giguère S, Berghaus LJ, Willingham-Lane JM.Pneumonia caused by remains an important cause of disease and death in foals. The combination of a macrolide (erythromycin, azithromycin, or clarithromycin) with rifampin has been the recommended treatment for foals with clinical signs of infection caused by since the early 1980s with, until recently, only rare reports of resistance. Resistance to macrolides and rifampin in isolates of cultured from horses is increasing, with isolates resistant to all macrolides and rifampin now being cultured from up to 40% of infected foals at some farms. This text reviews the available data regarding ant...
Miller FL, Bellaw JL, Lyons ET, Nielsen MK.Strongyloides westeri is a threadworm parasite found in the small intestine mainly in foals at up to about 4 months of age. This parasite is associated with small intestinal enteritis and diarrhea as well as skin irritation and a clinical syndrome called "frenzied behavior" due to percutaneous invasion. The aim of this study was to investigate S. westeri parasite burdens in age groups older than the initial lactogenic transmission phase. Secondary aims were to examine the impact of host age and gender on worm burden and egg output in naturally infected foals. Thirteen foals were enrolled in th...
Schwartz EJ, Vaidya NK, Dorman KS, Carpenter S, Mealey RH.Understanding the dynamics of acute viral infection is crucial for developing strategies to prevent and control infection. In this study, lentiviral dynamics in a host without adaptive immunity were examined in order to determine kinetic parameters of infection and quantify the effect of neutralizing antibodies in preventing infection, using mathematical modeling of data from equine infectious anemia virus (EIAV) infection of horses with severe combined immunodeficiency (SCID). Estimated parameters were used to calculate the basic reproductive number and virus doubling time and found that the ...
Brunsting JY, Pille FJ, Oosterlinck M, Haspeslagh M, Wilderjans HC.To determine the incidence of infection and associated risk factors, after elective arthroscopy. Methods: Retrospective case study. Methods: Horses (n=1079) undergoing elective arthroscopy. Methods: Medical records of all horses that underwent elective arthroscopy between 2006 and 2013 were reviewed. Age, gender, breed, surgeon, number of joints operated, total anesthetic time, perioperative antimicrobial administration, and the presence and size of osteochondral fragments/subchondral lesions were recorded. For each operated joint, the development of postoperative infection (surgical site infe...
Favaro PF, Fernandes WR, Reischak D, Brandão PE, Silva SOS, Richtzenhain LJ.Equine influenza is one of the major respiratory infectious diseases in horses. An equine influenza virus outbreak was identified in vaccinated and unvaccinated horses in a veterinary school hospital in São Paulo, SP, Brazil, in September 2015. The twelve equine influenza viruses isolated belonged to Florida Clade 1. The hemagglutinin and neuraminidase amino acid sequences were compared with the recent isolates from North and South America and the World Organisation for Animal Health recommended Florida Clade 1 vaccine strain. The hemagglutinin amino acid sequences had nine substitutions, com...
Thu VT, Kim HK, Han J.Numerous animal cardiac exercise models using animal subjects have been established to uncover the cardiovascular physiological mechanism of exercise or to determine the effects of exercise on cardiovascular health and disease. In most cases, animal-based cardiovascular exercise modalities include treadmill running, swimming, and voluntary wheel running with a series of intensities, times, and durations. Those used animals include small rodents (e.g., mice and rats) and large animals (e.g., rabbits, dogs, goats, sheep, pigs, and horses). Depending on the research goal, each experimental protoc...
Sharav T, Konnai S, Ochirkhuu N, Ts EO, Mekata H, Sakoda Y, Umemura T, Murata S, Chultemdorj T, Ohashi K.The genetic characterization and actual prevalence of EIAV in Mongolian horse in the disease endemic region is currently unknown. Here, 11 of 776 horse serum samples from four Mongolian provinces tested positive on agar gel immunodiffusion test. Genomic DNA extracted from all seropositive samples was subjected to nested PCR assay. Among these, three samples tested positive with nested PCR assay and were identified by sequencing analysis based on long termination repeat and tat gene of the virus. Two of the three sequences were identical, with 94.0% identity with the third. These two independen...
Dias de Castro LL, Abrahão CLH, Buzatti A, Molento MB, Bastianetto E, Rodrigues DS, Lopes LB, Silva MX, de Freitas MG, Conde MH, Borges FA.The aim of this study was to compare two fecal egg count (FEC) techniques; McMaster (McM) and Mini-FLOTAC (mF), for the detection of cattle and horse gastrointestinal nematode eggs, in different locations. Experiment 1: feces were collected from 16 cattle and FEC was performed individually, using mF with the sensitivity of 5 eggs per gram of feces (EPG) and McM with a sensitivity of 50 EPG at Empresa de Pesquisa Agropecuária de Minas Gerais - EPAMIG and the Laboratory of Parasitic Diseases of the University of Parana - LDP/UFPR. Experiment 2: Fecal samples from 30 horses were analyzed with mF...
Nemoto M, Kanno T, Bannai H, Tsujimura K, Yamanaka T, Kokado H.A vaccine for equine coronavirus (ECoV) is so far unavailable. Bovine coronavirus (BCoV) is antigenically related to ECoV; it is therefore possible that BCoV vaccine will induce antibodies against ECoV in horses. This study investigated antibody response to ECoV in horses inoculated with BCoV vaccine. Virus neutralization tests showed that antibody titers against ECoV increased in all six horses tested at 14 days post inoculation, although the antibody titers were lower against ECoV than against BCoV. This study showed that BCoV vaccine provides horses with antibodies against ECoV to some exte...
Taylor KA, Durrheim D, Heller J, O'Rourke B, Hope K, Merritt T, Freeman P, Chicken C, Carrick J, Branley J, Massey P.Psittacosis is a rare but potentially fatal zoonosis caused by Chlamydia psittaci, an organism that is typically associated with bird contact. However C. psittaci is capable of infecting other non-avian hosts, such as horses, sheep, cattle and goats. Stud staff and veterinarians have significant exposure to parturient animals and reproductive materials in their routine work. To investigate the zoonotic potential associated with the emergence of C. psittaci as an abortifacient agent in horses, we established a programme of joint human and animal surveillance in a sentinel horse-breeding regio...
Tatz AJ, Segev G, Steinman A, Berlin D, Milgram J, Kelmer G.There is a consensus in the veterinary literature that Parascaris equorum (ascarid) impaction carries a poor prognosis. Hence surgery is often delayed and foals are often subjected to euthanasia after diagnosis of ascarid impaction is established. Our clinical impression was that ascarid impaction carries a better prognosis than previously reported. Objective: Our expectation was that manually evacuating the impaction into the caecum, thus refraining from opening the small intestine, would improve the prognosis for survival of horses with ascarid impaction. The aim of this study was to examine...
Montinaro A, Gianfreda CD, Proto P.Serous sheets are currently used in Neurosurgery as dural substitute. The aim of this study is to demonstrate that the horse pericardium, which has the essential charasteristics of reabsorbable membranes and moreover is BSE-free, is an excellent dural substitute. Methods: 200 patients, 53 suffering from cranial traumatic conditions and 97 from cranial and craniospinal neoplastic pathologies, underwent a surgical procedure with the application of horse pericardium as a dural prosthesis. Results: The follow-up controls of the patients included a neurosurgical visit and advanced diagnostic imagin...
Johnson PJ, Slight SH, Ganjam VK, Kreeger JM.The administration of exogenously administered GCs and syndromes associated with GC excess are both attended by increased risk for the development of laminitis in adult horses. However, there exists substantial controversy as to whether excess GCs cause laminitis de novo. If true, the pathogenesis of laminitis arising from the effects of GC excess is probably different from that associated with diseases of the gastrointestinal tract and endotoxemia. Although a satisfactory explanation for the development of laminitis as a consequence of GC action is currently lacking, numerous possible and pla...
Slauson DO, Lewis RM.Glomerulonephritis constitutes an important category of renal diseases in animals and has been recognized with increasing frequency in the last decade. We report here the comparative morphologic aspects of glomerulonephritis as a naturally occurring disease of animals. We briefly review the immunopathogenesis of glomerulonephritis. The morphology of renal lesions occurring in glomerulonephritis in dogs, cats, cattle, sheep, horses and swine has been reviewed with emphasis on the range and specificity of various glomerular lesions and on the comparison of lesions between various species. A dist...
Brooks DE, Andrew SE, Dillavou CL, Ellis G, Kubilis PS.To evaluate in vitro susceptibility to topical antifungal medications, as measured by minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) and 50% inhibitory concentration (IC50%), of fungal isolates from horses with ulcerative keratomycosis in Florida; to compare results with those of other studies to identify differences in susceptibility patterns among fungi isolated from horses in different geographic regions; and to note indications of fungal resistance to drugs tested in other studies. Methods: Corneal fungal cultures from client-owned horses from Florida with ulcerative keratomycosis (n = 22). Method...
Pethick FE, Lainson AF, Yaga R, Flockhart A, Smith DG, Donachie W, Cerdeira LT, Silva A, Bol E, Lopes TS, Barbosa MS, Pinto AC, Dos Santos AR....Corynebacterium pseudotuberculosis causes disease in several animal species, although distinct biovars exist that appear to be restricted to specific hosts. In order to facilitate a better understanding of the differences between biovars, we report here the complete genome sequence of the equine pathogen Corynebacterium pseudotuberculosis strain 1/06-A.
Wood JL, Chanter N, Newton JR, Burrell MH, Dugdale D, Windsor HM, Windsor GD, Rosendal S, Townsend HG.Lower respiratory tract disease developed in a group of racehorses in training between two and six years of age. Disease was observed in 22 of 25 horses for which full records were available. Seroconversion to Mycoplasma felis was demonstrated by indirect haemagglutination assay in 19 of 22 paired sera and high titres (> or = 64) were found in convalescent sera from the three remaining horses. Evidence of respiratory viral infection was confined to seroconversions to equine herpesvirus-4 in two of the horses. Tracheal wash samples, taken from four horses with visibly increased tracheal muco...
Hamlen HJ, Timoney JF, Bell RJ.A 2-phase study was performed to characterize the effects of Streptococcus equi infection in unexposed and previously exposed foals. In phase I, 22 weanling foals involved in a naturally occurring S equi epizootic were studied, along with a comparison group of 11 unexposed foals, matched for age, sex, and breed. Six months later (phase II), an epizootic was experimentally induced in previously exposed and unexposed foals from phase I. The prevalence and duration of clinical signs, the relative risk of developing disease, bacteriologic culture results, hematologic responses, and mucosal and ser...
Kamm JL, Riley CB, Parlane N, Gee EK, McIlwraith CW.Despite significant immunosuppressive activity, allogeneic mesenchymal stromal cells (MSCs) carry an inherent risk of immune rejection when transferred into a recipient. In naïve recipients, this immune response is initially driven by the innate immune system, an immediate reaction to the foreign cells, and later, the adaptive immune system, a delayed response that causes cell death due to recognition of specific alloantigens by host cells and antibodies. This review describes the actions of MSCs to both suppress and activate the different arms of the immune system. We then review the surviva...
Aboling S, Drotleff AM, Cappai MG, Kamphues J.Because the occurrence of Claviceps in European pastures may have been overlooked to cause serious health problem for grazing animals, we documented the degree of Claviceps contamination in two horse pastures and estimated whether the horses could have ingested a critical quantity of alkaloids. We counted the Claviceps sclerotia and determined alkaloid levels using high performance liquid chromatography with fluorescence detection. Depending on the location, the number of sclerotia varied from 0.09 to 0.19 per square meter (central area) and from 0.23 to 55.8 per square meter (border strips). ...
Sponseller BA, de Macedo MM, Clark SK, Gallup JM, Jones DE.Foals are particularly vulnerable to infection by Rhodococcus equi during the first 2 weeks of life whereas mature horses are not. While an innate immunodeficiency likely accounts for this clinically relevant vulnerability, the factors that contribute to infection by R. equi have not been fully elucidated. In this study, we demonstrate that cells of the monocyte lineage, including monocytes, macrophages, and dendritic cells, that have been activated with LPS and IFN-gamma, respond with a statistically significant, greater amount of cytokine mRNA production of IL-10, IL-12p35, and IL-12p40 than...
Adams AA, Sturgill TL, Breathnach CC, Chambers TM, Siger L, Minke JM, Horohov DW.Equine influenza virus is a leading cause of respiratory disease in the horse population; however, the susceptibility of old horses to EIV infection remains unknown. While advanced age in horses (>20 years) is associated with age-related changes in immune function, there are no specific recommendations regarding the vaccination of older horses even though a well-characterized effect of aging is a reduced antibody response to standard vaccination. Therefore, we evaluated the immunological and physiological response of aged horses to a live non-replicating canarypox-vectored EIV vaccine and s...
Flaminio MJ, Nydam DV, Marquis H, Matychak MB, Giguère S.Susceptibility of foals to Rhodococcus equi pneumonia is exclusive to the first few months of life. The objective of this study was to investigate the immediate immunologic response of foal and adult horse antigen-presenting cells (APCs) upon infection with R. equi. We measured the activation of the antigen-presenting major histocompatibility complex (MHC) class II molecule, costimulatory molecules CD40 and CD86, the cytokine interleukin-12 (IL-12), and the transcriptional factor interferon regulatory factor 1 (IRF-1) in monocyte-derived macrophages (mMOs) and dendritic cells (mDCs) of adult h...
Nagy AD, Simhofer H.To report use of mandibular condylectomy for treatment of advanced degenerative joint disease of the temporomandibular joint (TMJ) caused by sepsis. Methods: Clinical case report. Methods: Two-year-old Noriker filly. Methods: Computed tomography (CT) was used to confirm advanced degenerative joint disease of the left TMJ and for follow-up after mandibular condylectomy and removal of necrotic meniscus. Results: Painful swelling (3 weeks duration) with drainage located just caudal to the left lateral canthus of the eye was associated with atrophy of the left masseter muscle, masticatory problems...
Oaks JL, Ulibarri C, Crawford TB.Equine infectious anaemia virus (EIAV) infection of horses is characterized clinically by recurrent episodes of fever, thrombocytopenia and anaemia. In vivo, the only site of virus replication that has been previously demonstrated for EIAV is the tissue macrophage. In this study, in situ hybridization for EIAV was combined with immunohistochemistry for cell-type-specific markers to identify infected endothelial cells. EIAV-infected endothelial cells and macrophages were detected in horses infected with either virulent wild-type or with weakly virulent tissue culture-adapted strains of EIAV. Th...
Bjørn H, Sommer C, Schougård H, Henriksen SA, Nansen P.This study was undertaken to establish whether anthelmintic resistance was present in nematode parasites of horses in Denmark. Sixteen horse farms were selected for faecal egg count reduction (FECR) tests to measure the efficacy of the anthelmintic used. Resistance to benzimidazole anthelmintics was found on 13 of the 16 farms, with FECR values ranging from 80.0% to -101.3%. On the remaining 3 farms FECR was 100.0%, 99.3% and 97.2%. Results of a questionnaire study on anthelmintic usage, parasite control measures and management practices showed that horses in this study were treated on average...
Deeg CA.Equine recurrent uveitis (ERU) is a wide spread disease of the eye, which is the main cause for blindness in horses worldwide. Meanwhile, ERU is also accepted as the only reliable spontaneous model for human autoimmune uveitis. We identified and characterized novel autoantigens by analyzing the autoantibody-binding pattern from ERU cases to the retinal proteome. Cellular retinaldehyde-binding protein (CRALBP) and malate dehydrogenase (MDH) were detected as novel ERU autoantigens by this approach. B- and T-cell autoreactivity was detected to both autoantigens in ERU cases. The evaluation of the...
Kydd JH, Case R, Winton C, MacRae S, Sharp E, Ricketts SL, Rash N, Newton JR.Identification of risk factors which are associated with severe clinical signs can assist in the management of disease outbreaks and indicate future research areas. Pregnancy loss during late gestation in the mare compromises welfare, reduces fecundity and has financial implications for horse owners. This retrospective study focussed on the identification of risk factors associated with pregnancy loss among 46 Thoroughbred mares on a single British stud farm, with some but not all losses involving equid herpesvirus-1 (EHV-1) infection. In a sub-group of 30 mares, association between pregnancy ...
Sentsui H, Kono Y.During the autumn of 1978 a disease characterised by fever and occasionally by exanthema and/or oedema of the limbs was seen in approximately 13 per cent of horses in a training stable in the Kanto district of Japan. A virus was isolated by the intracerebral inoculation of one-day-old mice from blood and nasal swabs taken from naturally and experimentally infected horses. The virus was subsequently passaged in two monkey kidney cell lines in which it produced complete cytopathic changes. Infected horses developed neutralising, complement fixing and haemagglutinin inhibiting antibodies to the v...
Tydén E, Morrison DA, Engström A, Nielsen MK, Eydal M, Höglund J.The large roundworm of horses, Parascaris equorum is considered ubiquitous in breeding operations, and is regarded as a most important helminth pathogen of foals. Over the past decade, this parasite has been reported increasingly resistant to anthelmintic drugs worldwide. This paper reports analysis of the population genetic structure of P. equorum. Adult parasites (n=194) collected from Sweden, Norway, Iceland, Germany, Brazil and the USA were investigated by amplified restriction fragment length polymorphism (AFLP) analysis. The genetic variation was low (Hj=0.12-0.4), for the global populat...
Sánchez-Matamoros A, Kukielka D, De las Heras AI, Sánchez-Vizcaíno JM.Cytokine secretion is one of the main mechanisms by which the immune system is regulated in response to pathogens. Therefore, the measurement of cytokine expression is fundamental to characterizing the immune response to infections. Real-time quantitative reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR) is widely used to measure cytokine mRNA levels, but assay conditions should be properly evaluated before analyzing important equine infections through relative quantification of gene expression. The aim of this study was to develop and evaluate a set of RT-qPCR assays for a panel of th...
Pusterla N, Lutz H, Braun U.Four clinically healthy horses which were negative for antibodies to Ehrlichia phagocytophila, the agent of bovine ehrlichiosis, were infected experimentally with E phagocytophila-containing bovine leucocytes, administered intravenously. The horses were examined daily for four weeks, and blood samples were collected daily for cytological, haematological and biochemical examination and for a nested polymerase chain reaction (PCR). An indirect immunofluorescence test was used to determine when the horses seroconverted and the duration of positive titres. There were no abnormal clinical, haematol...
Minervini F, Giannoccaro A, Nicassio M, Panzarini G, Lacalandra GM.Ochratoxin A (OTA) is a renal mycotoxin and transplacental genotoxic carcinogen. The aim of this study was to evaluate the natural occurrence of OTA in equine blood samples and its placental transfer. For the assessment of OTA levels, serum samples were collected from 12 stallions, 7 cycling mares and 17 pregnant mares. OTA was found in 83% of serum samples (median value = 121.4 pg/mL). For the assessment of placental transfer, serum samples were collected from the 17 mares after delivery and from the umbilical cords of their foals, after foaling. Fourteen serum samples from pregnant mares con...
Takai S, Kawazu S, Tsubaki S.Humoral immune response to Rhodococcus equi in experimentally infected foals was studied with the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) method. Class-specific antibodies were measured by ELISA in the sera of foals after intratracheal or oral inoculation with R. equi ATCC 6939 or T 48 and in the lung washings of a foal after intratracheal inoculation or of normal horses. After intratracheal or oral inoculation with R. equi, serum antibodies were first detected in immunoglobulin G (IgG) followed by IgM and IgA classes, but significant levels of IgM and IgA developed only in the foal infected...
Ficorilli N, Studdert MJ, Crabb BS.The nucleotide sequence of the glycoprotein G (gG) homologue of asinine herpesvirus 3 (AHV3), a respiratory alphaherpesvirus of donkeys, was determined. The AHV3 gG gene consists of 1233 base pairs (bp) and codes for a predicted protein of 411 amino acids. This is identical in size to the equine herpesvirus 1 (EHV1) gG gene and 6 amino acids longer than the equine herpesvirus 4 (EHV4) gG gene. The predicted amino acid sequence of AHV3 gG has characteristics of a class 1 membrane protein. The amino acid sequence of AHV3 gG shows 92% and 60% identity to EHV1 gG and EHV4 gG respectively. Two regi...
Lehmbecker A, Liebing J, Barthel Y, Habierski A, Cavalleri J, Puff C, Rademacher B, Lumpe S, Beineke A.Neurolymphomatosis is a rare manifestation of lymphoma and is characterized by neoplastic infiltration of the peripheral nervous system. The present report describes neoplastic infiltration of peripheral nerves in three horses with multicentric lymphoma. Immunohistochemistry revealed the presence of CD79a(+) lymphoblastic cells and well-differentiated CD3(+) T cells, characteristic of T-cell-rich B-cell lymphoma in all cases. Nerve infiltration by lymphoma is rare, but should be considered as a differential diagnosis for peripheral neuropathy in horses with lymphoma.
Rosin-Arbesfeld R, Rivlin M, Noiman S, Mashiah P, Yaniv A, Miki T, Tronick SR, Gazit A.Three cDNA clones representing structurally distinct transcripts were isolated from a cDNA library prepared from cells infected with equine infectious anemia virus (EIAV) by using a probe representing the S3 open reading frame, which is thought to encode Rev. One species, designated p2/2, contained four exons and was identical to a previously described polycistronic mRNA that encodes Tat. This transcript was predicted to also direct the synthesis of a truncated form of the transmembrane protein and a putative Rev protein whose N-terminal 29 amino acids, derived from env, are linked to S3 seque...
Lampe V, Dierks C, Distl O.Osteochondrosis (OC) is an inherited developmental disease in young horses most frequently observed in thoroughbreds, trotters, warmblood and coldblood horses. Quantitative trait loci (QTL) for equine OC have been identified in Hanoverian warmblood horses employing a whole genome scan with microsatellites. A QTL on ECA16 reached the genome-wide significance level for hock osteochondrosis dissecans (OCD). The aim of this study was to refine this QTL on ECA16 using an extended marker set of 34 newly developed microsatellites and 15 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). We used the same 14 pate...
Timoney JF, Suther P, Velineni S, Artiushin SC.Resistance to phagocytosis is a crucial virulence property of Streptococcus equi (Streptococcus equi subsp. equi; Se), the cause of equine strangles. The contribution and interdependence of capsule and SeM to killing in equine blood and neutrophils were investigated in naturally occurring strains of Se. Strains CF32, SF463 were capsule and SeM positive, strains Lex90, Lex93 were capsule negative and SeM positive and strains Se19, Se1-8 were capsule positive and SeM deficient. Phagocytosis and killing of Se19, Se1-8, Lex90 and Lex93 in equine blood and by neutrophils suspended in serum were sig...
Reyna-Bello A, García FA, Rivera M, Sansó B, Aso PM.The standardization of ELISA for the detection of anti-Trypanosoma evansi antibodies in naturally and experimentally infected horses is described. Bayesian analysis was used to establish the cutoff between positive and negative sera. In order to determine the assessment of the ELISA test, the results obtained were compared with those from an IFA. A relative sensibility of 98.39%, a specificity of 95.12% and a predictive value of 96.83% were determined. The standardized technique was used to evaluate the antibody production against trypanosome in an experimentally infected equine, in which the ...
