Epidemiological Aspects and Clinicopathological Findings in Cats Naturally Infected with Feline Leukemia Virus (FeLV) and/or Feline Immunodeficiency Virus (FIV)

Abstract

Infections produced by feline immunodeficiency virus (FIV) and feline leukemia virus (FeLV), two of the most prevalent pathogens in cats, range from passing unnoticed to presenting a wide variety of clinical signs. Different epidemiological, clinical, hematological and virological parameters were analyzed in 78 FIV-and/or FeLV-infected cats. FeLV-infected (FeLV + ) cats were considerably younger than FIV-infected (FIV + ) cats, and in general were seen to have a more severe disease than FIV + cats. Around one third of the cats presented anemia, and neutropenia was also frequently observed. Though a higher percentage of FIV + than FeLV + cats had altered leukocyte counts, FeLV + cats had altered counts of both neutrophils and lymphocytes more frequently than FIV + , which usually presented only either altered neutrophils or lymphocyte counts. Virological markers were only detected in FeLV + cats, either as mono-or dual-infection, and correlated with the severity of the disease, but not in FIV + cats. In conclusion, these results suggest that FeLV affects more blood cell types and provokes death of affected animals at a much earlier age than FIV and that the severity of the disease seemed to depend on the viral status of the cat.

Evaluation of clinical and haematological parameters in differentiation of feline immunodeficiency and feline leukemia virus infection

“…Doubly infected cats showed less severe symptoms than mono-infected animals, and the results were in general closer to those of FIV+ than FeLV+ cats (COLLaDO et al, 2012), which was also observed in our study.…”

“…Hematological (COLLaDO et al, 2012). In our research as well FIV + cats were generally younger than FeLV + cats.…”

“…In that research no significant difference was noticed in values of urea and creatinine, that would indicate kidney failure, between non-infected and infected cats. high levels of urea (>20 to 50 mg urea/dl) were noticed in 45.8% of FeLV + cats, 62.5% of FIV+ cats and 51% of FIV and FeLV negative cats (COLLaDO et al, 2012).…”

“…the reason may be that the studied cats were in different clinical phases of the disease, and each was characterised by specific symptoms. The most common changes were neutropenia and lymphopenia (33.3 FeLV+ cats) and lymphopenia (37.5% FIV+ cats), (COLLaDO et al, 2012).…”

Feline immunodeficiency virus and feline leukemia virus: frequency and associated factors in cats in northeastern Brazil

“…Blood samples were collected from these animals in their homes. The inclusion criteria were: 1) it needed to be asymptomatic, i.e., clinical examination did not show any abnormalities suggestive of systemic disease such as vomiting, diarrhea, weight loss, nasal secretion, or neoplasia (Collado et al, 2012), 2) it had to be 6 months of age or over. In addition to these animals, 30 samples from stray cats were sent by veterinarians at the zoonosis control centers of these cities.…”