AHEAD IN ANIMAL HEALTH
Haemorrhagic diathesis in piglets: an attempt to decipher the causes Lucía Dieste-Pérez, Erhard van Der Vries, Manon Houben, Theo Geudeke, Karin Junker, Lianneke Bosma Royal GD, Deventer, The Netherlands
Understanding the cause of haemorrhagic diathesis in suckling piglets would support farmers and veterinarians to better approach and handle these cases in the future. Material and methods
Discussion and Conclusion
Fourteen piglets around 11 days old from 5 different farms showing petechiae, and 12 control pigs from 4 of these farms where killed and subjected to pathological examination. Blood was collected during exsanguination for haematological screening, IgG and PIGMAP analysis and platelet function. From cases and controls from 2 of these farms, total nucleic acids were extracted from isolated platelets for metagenomics analysis exploring the potential role of virus infection. Differences between case and control piglets were analysed by t-test by STATA 15.
Piglets with haemorrhagic diathesis showed regenerative anaemia and mild acute inflammatory reaction, not clearly related with a viral infection. Research must go on!
Results Table 1 Summary of the pathological and blood results Cases (n=14) Pathological diagnosis
Serum IgG PIGMAP Erythrocytes MCV**
44% Haemorrhagic diathesis
No relevant findings
No differences between cases and controls Higher (p<0.05) in cases than in controls, and slightly above normal values, signs of certain acute inflammatory reaction Low in both, cases and controls, but significantly lower (p<0.01) in cases Higher (p<0.001) in cases than in controls, showing a reactive bone marrow in the affected piglets
Haemoglobin
Generally low, but lower in cases (p=0.05)
Thrombocytes
Lower (p<0.01) in cases than in controls, although always within normal range
MPV*** Virus metagenomics analysis
Two case piglets showing skin petechiae
36% Haemorrhagic diathesis + signs of sepsis*
Controls (n=12)
Higher (p<0.001) in cases, showing higher presence of young platelets Signals for several viruses detected in both cases and controls
* Sepsis due to Gram+ bacteria, as well as specific infection with Streptococcus suis, Staphylococcus hiycus or Escherichia coli ** MCV: mean corpuscular volume *** MPV: mean platelet volume
L.diesteperez@gdanimalhealth.com www.gdanimalhealth.com
GD2573/04-22