Diagnosis Of Inflammatory Bowel Disease In A Serval (Leptailurus Serval) And Treatment With Budesonide.

Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is defined as gastrointestinal signs, with incomplete response to dietary management and anthelmintics, histological injuries with intestinal mucosa inflammation, and response to immunomodulatory therapies.1,2 This report is about an adult, female, serval (Leptailurus serval), with history of intermittent episodes of vomiting, diarrhea and hematochezia per four years. Clinical signs: thickened intestines; macrocytic hypochromic anemia; hypoproteinemia; low serum levels of folate and cobalamin; low infection by ascarids; growth of Campylobacter spp in rectal swab culture. Treatment: fenbendazole 50 mg/kg PO SID for five days and repeated the protocol after 15 days; erythromycin 12mg/kg PO BID for ten days; and dietary trial with novel proteins. After treatment coproparasitological and Campylobacter spp. cultive were negative, but there was no remission of clinical signs and it were not seen significant differences in the ultrasonography and blood tests. To define between IBD and gastrointestinal lymphoma, endoscopic guided mucosal biopsy samples of stomach and duodenum were collected and mesenteric lymph node and full thickness biopsy samples of the jejunum and ileum were collected through laparoscopic guided laparotomy. Histopatology concluded the diagnosis of IBD and it was initiated treatment with budesonide 1mg PO SID, a locally active steroid with minimal systemic effects.3 There was complete remission of the clinical signs, significant reduction in the thickening of the bowel, and the blood tests were clinically normal. Chronic treatment with budesonide was maintained and after a year the clinical condition remains stable. In conclusion, budesonide was effective in treating IBD in this animal.

Plasmodium (Novyella) nucleophilum from an Egyptian Goose in São Paulo Zoo, Brazil: microscopic confirmation and molecular characterization

Plasmodium (Novyella) nucleophilum was identified using microscopy and PCR, in an Egyptian Goose (Alopochen aegyptiacus) that died in São Paulo Zoo, Brazil. This parasite is characterized by elongated gametocytes, small meronts with scant cytoplasm, less than eight merozoites and mainly for having all the stages appressed to the nuclei of infected erythrocytes. Additionally, Plasmodium (Haemamoeba) sp. was identified by microscopy in the same blood sample. The latter parasite lacks nucleophilic blood stages and is characterized by large roundish trophozoites, each with a large prominent centrally collated vacuole. This co-infection was not confirmed by PCR amplification of the mitochondrial cytochrome b (cytb) gene and sequencing; only one Plasmodium sp. cytb sequence was detected in the blood sample. Since parasitemia of P. nucleophilum (2.4%) was much higher than that of P. (Haemamoeba) sp. (0.2%), PCR may have favored the amplification of the cytb sequence of the former. Phylogenetic analysis is in agreement with this conclusion because the reported cytb sequence was positioned in the same branch of sequences of several Novyella species. This is the first assignment of the mitochondrial cytb gene sequence to P. nucleophilum. The P. (Haemamoeba) parasite is particularly similar to Plasmodium (Haemamoeba) tejerai, because its advanced trophozoites and young erythrocytic meronts possess a large vacuole with prominent pigment granules arranged around it, the characteristic features of development in this species. For definitive identification of P. (Haemamoeba) species, mature meronts and gametocytes are required; however, these were absent from the thin blood smear. Representative images of the blood stages of P. nucleophilum and P. (Haemamoeba) sp. are provided. Together with microscopy data, the P. nucleophilum cytb sequence will assist in molecular identification (barcoding) of this Plasmodium species in other birds.