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There is currently no specific treatment for the virus. A vaccine is available, but only experimentally. It has not been released to the public due to the risk it poses to already exposed birds.
Therapeutic intervention is limited to treating secondary infections. The individual bird can sometimes recover, but this is rare. If only the feathers are affected and the bird suffers no other symptoms, it can usually experience an acceptable quality of life. But if the bird's beak or nails are affected, veterinarians will recommend euthanasia.
The management of the disease lies thus mostly in prevention. Every new bird that enters a pen with other birds should be quarantined first and be tested for BFDV. Birds which are known carriers should not be introduced into new pens, especially not if those contain young birds.
Often no treatment is required. However, as porcine cytomegalovirus is a herpes virus it remains latent and sheds at times of stress. Therefore husbandry measures to minimise stress levels should be in place.
François Madec, a French author, has written many recommendations on how reduce PMWS symptoms. They are mostly measures for disinfection, management, and hygiene, referred to as the "20 Madec Points" [Madec & Waddilove, 2002].
These measures have recently been expanded upon by Dr. David Barcellos, a professor at the Veterinary College in the Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. He presented these points at "1st Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul Symposium about swine management, reproduction, and hygiene".
He divided his points by pig growth stage, and they can be loosely summarized as:
- keep the gutters clean
- increase feeder space
- use pens or small cages with solid dividers
- avoid mixing pigs from different origins
- improve the quality of air
- decrease maximum capacity, giving each pig more room
- separate sick animals as soon as possible, and treat them in a hospital pen. If they do not respond to antibiotics in three days, they should be culled
- control access of people and other animals
- reduce invironmental stress factors such as gases and air currents
- use immunizations and preventive medications for secondary agents commonly associated with PMWS
Tiamulin, chlortetracycline or tilmicosin may be used to treat and prevent the spread of the disease.
Vaccination is a very effective method of control, and also has an effect on pig productivity.
Eradication of the disease is possible but the organism commonly reinfects herds.
Infections are treated with antibiotics, particularly doxycycline, and the acute symptoms appear to respond to these drugs.
Treatment is symptomatic and aims to prevent dehydration in young pigs, using products such as electrolyte and energy supplements. Good biosecurity protocols such as adequate quarantine, isolation of cases, and disinfection help prevent entry or spread of the disease in the herd. In Canada, the Canadian Swine Health Board developed detailed protocols on how to adequately disinfect transportation vehicles for live hogs and ensure the quality of the disinfecttion protocol.
Antibiotics such as tetracyclines, rifampin, and the aminoglycosides streptomycin and gentamicin are effective against "Brucella" bacteria. However, the use of more than one antibiotic is needed for several weeks, because the bacteria incubate within cells.
Surveillance using serological tests, as well as tests on milk like the milk ring test, can be used for screening and play an important role in campaigns to eliminate the disease. Also, individual animal testing both for trade and for disease-control purposes is practiced. In endemic areas, vaccination is often used to reduce the incidence of infection. An animal vaccine is available that uses modified live bacteria. The World Organisation for Animal Health "Manual of Diagnostic Test and Vaccines for Terrestrial Animals" provides detailed guidance on the production of vaccines. As the disease is closer to being eliminated, a test and stamping out program is required to completely eliminate it.
The gold standard treatment for adults is daily intramuscular injections of streptomycin 1 g for 14 days and oral doxycycline 100 mg twice daily for 45 days (concurrently). Gentamicin 5 mg/kg by intramuscular injection once daily for seven days is an acceptable substitute when streptomycin is not available or contraindicated. Another widely used regimen is doxycycline plus rifampin twice daily for at least six weeks. This regimen has the advantage of oral administration. A triple therapy of doxycycline, with rifampin and co-trimoxazole, has been used successfully to treat neurobrucellosis.
Doxycycline is able to cross the blood–brain barrier, but requires the addition of two other drugs to prevent relapse. Ciprofloxacin and co-trimoxazole therapy is associated with an unacceptably high rate of relapse. In brucellic endocarditis, surgery is required for an optimal outcome. Even with optimal antibrucellic therapy, relapses still occur in 5 to 10% of patients with Malta fever.
The main way of preventing brucellosis is by using fastidious hygiene in producing raw milk products, or by pasteurizing all milk that is to be ingested by human beings, either in its unaltered form or as a derivate, such as cheese.
Most infections are mild and require no therapy or only symptomatic treatment. Because there is no virus-specific therapy, serious adenovirus illness can be managed only by treating symptoms and complications of the infection. Deaths are exceedingly rare but have been reported.
Porcine circoviral disease (PCVD) and Porcine circovirus associated disease (PCVAD), is a disease seen in domestic pigs. This disease causes illness in piglets, with clinical signs including progressive loss of body condition, visibly enlarged lymph nodes, difficulty in breathing, and sometimes diarrhea, pale skin, and jaundice. PCVD is very damaging to the pig-producing industry and has been reported worldwide. PCVD is caused by porcine circovirus type 2 (PCV-2).
The North American industry endorses "PCVAD" and European use "PCVD" to describe this disease.
No serious long-term effects are known for this disease, but preliminary evidence suggests, if such symptoms do occur, they are less severe than those associated with Lyme disease.
Safe and effective adenovirus vaccines were developed for adenovirus serotypes 4 and 7, but were available only for preventing ARD among US military recruits, and production stopped in 1996. Strict attention to good infection-control practices is effective for stopping transmission in hospitals of adenovirus-associated disease, such as epidemic keratoconjunctivitis. Maintaining adequate levels of chlorination is necessary for preventing swimming pool-associated outbreaks of adenovirus conjunctivitis.
The mortality of the disease in 1909, as recorded in the British Army and Navy stationed in Malta, was 2%. The most frequent cause of death was endocarditis. Recent advances in antibiotics and surgery have been successful in preventing death due to endocarditis. Prevention of human brucellosis can be achieved by eradication of the disease in animals by vaccination and other veterinary control methods such as testing herds/flocks and slaughtering animals when infection is present. Currently, no effective vaccine is available for humans. Boiling milk before consumption, or before using it to produce other dairy products, is protective against transmission via ingestion. Changing traditional food habits of eating raw meat, liver, or bone marrow is necessary, but difficult to implement. Patients who have had brucellosis should probably be excluded indefinitely from donating blood or organs. Exposure of diagnostic laboratory personnel to "Brucella" organisms remains a problem in both endemic settings and when brucellosis is unknowingly imported by a patient. After appropriate risk assessment, staff with significant exposure should be offered postexposure prophylaxis and followed up serologically for six months. Recently published experience confirms that prolonged and frequent serological follow-up consumes significant resources without yielding much information, and is burdensome for the affected staff, who often fail to comply. The side effects of the usual recommended regimen of rifampicin and doxycycline for three weeks also reduce treatment adherence. As no evidence shows treatment with two drugs is superior to monotherapy, British guidelines now recommend doxycycline alone for three weeks and a less onerous follow-up protocol.
Yersiniosis is usually self-limiting and does not require treatment. For severe infections (sepsis, focal infection) especially if associated with immunosuppression, the recommended regimen includes doxycycline in combination with an aminoglycoside. Other antibiotics active against "Y. enterocolitica" include trimethoprim-sulfamethoxasole, fluoroquinolones, ceftriaxone, and chloramphenicol. "Y. enterocolitica" is usually resistant to penicillin G, ampicillin, and cephalotin due to beta-lactamase production.
The acute form of the disease is manifested by lethargy, loss of appetite, vomiting and diarrhea. Due to the severe immune system suppression, multiple secondary infections develop, causing death within two to four weeks. Typical confirmation of the acute form of the disease is by necropsy, because it progresses too quickly for the normal signs such as feather loss and beak deformity to appear.
The chronic form occurs if the bird's immune system manages to mount a reaction to the virus and any secondary infections. The characteristic feather symptoms need time to develop, as they only appear during the first moult after infection. In those species having powder down, signs may be visible immediately, as powder down feathers are continually replenished.
A list of the more common and well-known diseases associated with infectious pathogens is provided and is not intended to be a complete listing.
A vaccine is available in the UK and Europe, however in laboratory tests it is not possible to distinguish between antibodies produced as a result of vaccination and those produced in response to infection with the virus. Management also plays an important part in the prevention of EVA.
Removing the pig from the stressful situation can prevent the episode.
Sedation and glucocorticoids may be beneficial.
Under anaesthesia, dantrolene sodium is a very effective treatment.
Genetic testing enables animals to be removed from the herd if they are positive for the gene. This means that the disorder is rare in the developed world these days.
Stress at slaughter should be minimised in all cases.
Inclusion Body Rhinitis, also known as IBR or Cytomegalic Inclusion Disease, is a pig disease caused by porcine cytomegalovirus, which is a member of the herpesvirus family. It is a notifiable disease that is found worldwide. It is spread both vertically and horizontally and prevalence is high.
It is not a zoonosis but the risk to humans that receive pig organ transplants is currently under investigation.
Other causes or associations of disease are: a compromised immune system, environmental toxins, radiation exposure, diet and lifestyle choices, stress, and genetics. Diseases may also be multifactorial, requiring multiple factors to induce disease. For example: in a murine model, Crohn's disease can be precipitated by a norovirus, but only when both a specific gene variant is present and a certain toxin has damaged the gut.
Limbic encephalitis is a rare condition with no randomised-controlled trials to guide treatment. Treatments that have been tried include intravenous immunoglobulin, plasmapheresis, corticosteroids, cyclophosphamide and rituximab.
If an associated tumour is found, then recovery is not possible until the tumour is removed. Unfortunately, this is not always possible, especially if the tumour is malignant and advanced.
Porcine enzootic pneumonia is caused by "Mycoplasma hyopneumoniae" and describes an important respiratory disease of pigs.
It is part of the Porcine Respiratory Disease Complex along with Swine Influenza, PRRS and Porcine circovirus 2, and even though on its own it is quite a mild disease, it predisposes to secondary infections with organisms such as "Pasteurella multocida".
Clinical signs are most commonly seen in pigs over 8 weeks of age, and the disease occurs worldwide. Transmission is horizontal and vertical from sows.
The current treatment of choice is the intravenous administration of dantrolene, the only known antidote, discontinuation of triggering agents, and supportive therapy directed at correcting hyperthermia, acidosis, and organ dysfunction. Treatment must be instituted rapidly on clinical suspicion of the onset of malignant hyperthermia.
Dantrolene is a muscle relaxant that appears to work directly on the ryanodine receptor to prevent the release of calcium. After the widespread introduction of treatment with dantrolene, the mortality of malignant hyperthermia fell from 80% in the 1960s to less than 5%. Dantrolene remains the only drug known to be effective in the treatment of MH. It is recommended that each hospital keeps a minimum stock of 36 dantrolene vials (720 mg) sufficient for a 70-kg person.
In eye disease, surgical removal is necessary for cysts within the eye itself as treating intraocular lesions with anthelmintics will elicit an inflammatory reaction causing irreversible damage to structural components. Cysts outside the globe can be treated with anthelmintics and steroids. Treatment recommendations for subcutaneous cysticercosis includes surgery, praziquantel and albendazole.
Asymptomatic cysts, such as those discovered incidentally on neuroimaging done for another reason, may never lead to symptomatic disease and in many cases do not require therapy. Calcified cysts have already died and involuted. Further antiparasitic therapy will be of no benefit.
Neurocysticercosis may present as hydrocephalus and acute onset seizures, thus the immediate therapy is emergent reduction of intracranial pressure and anticonvulsant medications. Once the seizures have been brought under control, antihelminthic treatments may be undertaken. The decision to treat with antiparasitic therapy is complex and based on the stage and number of cysts present, their location, and the persons specific symptoms.
Adult "Taenia solium" are easily treated with niclosamide, and is most commonly used in taeniasis. However cysticercosis is a complex disease and requires careful medication. Praziquantel (PZQ) is the drug of choice. In neurocysticercosis praziquantel is widely used. Albendazole appears to be more effective and a safe drug for neurocysticercosis. In complicated situation a combination of praziquantel, albendazole and steroid (such as corticosteroids to reduce the inflammation) is recommended. In the brain the cysts can be usually found on the surface. Most cases of brain cysts are found by accident, during diagnosis for other ailments. Surgical removals are the only option of complete removal even if treated successfully with medications.
Antiparasitic treatment should be given in combination with corticosteroids and anticonvulsants to reduce inflammation surrounding the cysts and lower the risk of seizures. When corticosteroids are given in combination with praziquantel, cimetidine is also given, as corticosteroids decrease action of praziquantel by enhancing its first pass metabolism. Albendazole is generally preferable over praziquantel due to its lower cost and fewer drug interactions.
Surgical intervention is much more likely to be needed in cases of intraventricular, racemose, or spinal neurocysticercosis. Treatments includes direct excision of ventricular cysts, shunting procedures, and removal of cysts via endoscopy.