Experiences and difficulties encountered during a course on veterinary public health with students of different nationalities

Veterinary public health (VPH) issues have received increased attention over the last few years as a result of the rising threat of emerging zoonoses (i.e., those due to globalized trade in animal and animal products and to changes in livestock production systems and the environment). The international dimension of VPH is gradually becoming recognized, and there is a growing need for veterinarians with experience in this field. In order to familiarize (future) veterinarians with the international dimension of VPH, the Department of Public Health and Food Safety of the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Utrecht University, has been organizing a course in Veterinary Public Health and Animal Production for over the last 10 years. This course has been intended for Dutch as well as foreign final-year veterinary students and recent veterinary graduates. By bringing together participants from different countries, the course reinforces the international dimension of the issues addressed through the exchange of experiences by the participants themselves. The present article provides information about this course on Veterinary Public Health (VPH): it discusses logistics, didactical approaches, the course program, and the use of information and communication technology (ICT). Special attention is given to the intercultural aspects of higher education, all of which play an important role in the efficient exchange of knowledge between lecturers and students. International courses are an important tool to enable participants to interact in a multicultural environment and address issues that demand international cooperation and a global public health focus.     

Monitoring the circadian rhythm of serum and salivary cortisol concentrations in the horse

Daily fluctuations of cortisol concentration in the blood or saliva have been repeatedly reported. However, several contradictions in the existing literature appear on this subject. The present study was performed to definitively establish options for testing adrenocortical function. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to evaluate parallel circadian rhythms in salivary and serum cortisol concentrations during a 24-h period. Twenty horses were examined under the same conditions. Blood and saliva samples were taken every 2 h for 24 h to determine the daily changes in cortisol concentrations of saliva and serum at rest and to determine the relationship between salivary and serum cortisol levels. Cosinor analysis of group mean data confirmed a significant circadian component for both serum and salivary cortisol concentrations (P < 0.001 in both cases). The serum cortisol circadian rhythm had an acrophase at 10:50 AM (95% CI, 10:00 AM–11:40 AM), a MESOR of 22.67 ng/mL, and an amplitude of 11.93 ng/mL. The salivary cortisol circadian rhythm had an acrophase at 10:00 AM (95% CI, 9:00 AM–11:00 AM), a MESOR of 0.52 ng/mL, and an amplitude of 0.12 ng/mL. We found a significant but weak association between salivary and serum cortisol concentrations; the Pearson correlation coefficient was 0.32 (P < 0.001). The use of salivary cortisol level as an indicator of hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis activity may be warranted. However, the salivary cortisol levels are more likely to be correlated with free plasma cortisol than with the total plasma cortisol concentration.     

Urinary Biomarkers for Acute Kidney Injury in Dogs

Routinely, kidney dysfunction and decreased glomerular filtration rate (GFR) are diagnosed by the evaluation of changes in the serum creatinine (SCr) and blood urea nitrogen (BUN) concentrations. However, neither of these tests is sensitive or specific enough for the early diagnosis of impaired kidney function because they are both affected by other renal and nonrenal factors. Furthermore, kidney injury can be present in the absence of kidney dysfunction. Renal reserve enables normal GFR even when nephrons are damaged. Renal biomarkers, especially those present in urine, may be useful for the study of both acute and chronic nephropathies. The aim of this review is to describe the current status of urinary biomarkers as diagnostic tools for kidney injury in dogs with particular focus on acute kidney injury (AKI). The International Renal Interest Society (IRIS) canine AKI grading system and the implementation of urinary biomarkers in this system also are discussed. The discovery of novel urinary biomarkers has emerged from hypotheses about the pathophysiology of kidney injury, but few proteomic urine screening approaches have been described in dogs. Lack of standardization of biomarker assays further complicates the comparison of novel canine urinary biomarker validation results among studies. Future research should focus on novel biomarkers of renal origin and evaluate promising biomarkers in different clinical conditions. Validation of selected urinary biomarkers in the diagnosis of canine kidney diseases must include dogs with both renal and nonrenal diseases to evaluate their sensitivity, specificity as well as their negative and positive predictive values.     

Bovine blood neutrophil acyloxyacyl hydrolase (AOAH) activity during endotoxin and coliform mastitis

The dynamics of blood neutrophil acyloxyacyl hydrolase (AOAH) activity, the appearance of endotoxin (lipopolysaccharide, LPS) in blood and the role of blood neutrophil AOAH in the severity of Escherichia coli and endotoxin mastitis were investigated in early postpartum dairy cows experimentally challenged with either endotoxin (n = 6) or E. coli (n = 6). The AOAH activity of blood neutrophils started to decrease significantly at post challenge hours (PCH) 6-24 and 12-24 in the endotoxin and E. coli-challenged groups, respectively; it returned to pre-challenged values at PCH 48 in both endotoxin- and E. coli-challenged groups. The cows were classified as moderate and severe responders according to milk production loss in the non-challenged quarters at PCH 48. There were no severe responders in the endotoxin-challenged group. In the E. coli-challenged group, only 1 severe responder was identified. The pre-challenge neutrophil AOAH activity of the severe responder was approximately 30% lower than that of moderate responders. No LPS was detected in the plasma of endotoxin-challenged cows; neither was it found in the plasma of moderate responders in the E. coli-challenged group at any PCH. However, at PCH 6, a remarkable amount of LPS was detected in the plasma of the severe responder from the E. coli-challenged group. Furthermore, neutrophil AOAH activity was increased by approximately 70% in the severe responder at PCH 6, but it increased by only approximately 15% in moderate responders. This was followed by a decreased neutrophil AOAH activity at PCH 12-24 and 24-72 in moderate and severe responders, respectively; the decreased AOAH activity at those PCH was more pronounced in the severe responder. The pronounced decreased neutrophil AOAH activity during mastitis often coincided with extreme leukopenia, neutropenia and a maximal number of immature neutrophils in the blood. Our results demonstrate that a decrease in neutrophil AOAH activity results in the appearance of LPS in the blood, and low blood neutrophil deacylation activity could be considered as a risk factor for severe clinical coliform mastitis.     

激活方法对水牛卵母细胞孤雌发育的影响

系统探讨了几种激活方法对水牛卵母细胞孤雌发育的影响。体外成熟 (IVM) 2 6 h的水牛卵母细胞经 7%乙醇(EH)、钙离子载体 (A2 3187)或离子霉素 (Ion)激活处理 5 min后 ,在 2 m mol/ L 6 -甲二氨基嘌呤 (6 - DMAP)中培养 3～4 h,然后再继续培养 6～ 11d,观察其胚胎发育情况。结果发现 ,5μmol/ L Ion激活处理的水牛卵母细胞分裂率显著高于 EH处理的卵母细胞 (6 3.0 % vs5 4 .2 % ,P<0 .0 5 ) ,其原核形成率也显著高于 EH处理的卵母细胞。激活处理前 ,无Ca2 培养液孵育时间的长短 ,对水牛卵母细胞孤雌发育无显著影响 (P>0 .0 5 )。如用 A2 3187激活处理水牛卵母细胞 ,其激活分裂率则随着浓度的升高而提高。从而表明 ,5 μmol/ L Ion可有效激活水牛卵母细胞     

Evidence for widespread Leishmania infantum infection among wild carnivores in L. infantum periendemic northern Spain

Leishmania spp. infection was investigated in tissue samples of wild carnivores from the Spanish Basque Country (BC), by PCR and DNA sequencing. The region is at the northern periphery of Leishmania infantum endemic Iberian Peninsula and infection in the dog (reservoir) or other species has not been previously reported. Leishmania kinetoplast DNA was detected by real-time PCR (rtPCR) in 28% (44/156) of animals. Specifically, in 26% of Eurasian badgers (n = 53), 29% of foxes (n = 48), 29% of stone martens (n = 21) and in 25–50% of less numerous species including genets, wild cats, pole cats, European mink and weasels. Infected animals particularly badgers, were most prevalent in the southernmost province of the BC (Araba) in areas dominated by arable land. Subsequent amplification and sequencing of a fragment of the rRNA internal transcribed spacer 2 (ITS2) from a subset of rtPCR positives samples confirmed the species as L. infantum, showing a high sequence homogeneity with ITS2 sequences of L. infantum from dogs and humans from southern Spain. In summary, this study reports for the first time L. infantum infection in wild carnivores from the BC including in stone martens, pole cats and minks in which infection has not been previously described. It supports the need to study infection in dogs and people in this region and is an example of the value of infection surveillance in wildlife to assess potential risks in the domestic environment and their role in spreading infections in non-endemic areas.     

Cytokine expression, glucocorticoid and growth hormone changes after porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome virus (PRRSV-1) infection in vaccinated and unvaccinated naturally exposed pigs

The objective of this paper was to study the changes of some cytokines and neuroendocrine hormones in vaccinated and unvaccinated pigs that were naturally infected by a PRRSV-1 (porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome virus) heterologous field strain. We analyzed gene expression of pro-inflammatory (TNF-α, IL-1β, MCP-1, IL-6), pro-immune (IFN-γ) and anti-inflammatory cytokines (IL-10) in PBMC, as well as hormonal (GH and cortisol) levels in blood samples of pigs obtained in a field trial previously reported [Martelli P, Gozio S, Ferrari L, Rosina S, De Angelis E, Quintavalla C, et al. Efficacy of a modified-live porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome virus (PRRSV) vaccine in pigs naturally exposed to a heterologous European (Italian cluster) field strain: clinical protection and cell-mediated immunity. Vaccine 2009;27:3788-99]. All vaccinated pigs showed an increase in pro-inflammatory and pro-immune cytokine gene expression with respect to controls and a prompt increase in GH that could be consistently associated with pro-inflammatory cytokines in sustaining innate immunity; moreover, the higher levels of cortisol indicates the activation of the hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis response. In contrast, unvaccinated pigs showed down-regulation of the cortisol and GH responses, and the pro-inflammatory and pro-immune cytokines remained at a basal or low level, with an increase of TNF-α and IL-6 in association with a higher level of IL-10 in the late phase of natural infection. The associated trends of pro-inflammatory and anti-inflammatory cytokines together with the cortisol level demonstrate that a previous vaccination promotes an early immune responsiveness in pigs and a more efficient control of inflammation in the late phase of infection with a heterologous PRRSV isolate; both events could sustain clinical protection.