Deworming is believed to be something that every shoveler will do, but have you ever repulsed a cat, but the cat still has symptoms of parasite infection?
If you shovelers haven't encountered such a situation, it means that you are lucky. I brushed up on a literature about trichomoniasis last night and suddenly thought about this topic and what I saw at a pet clinic a few years ago.
That time I just took the cat to do a physical examination, and I saw a shoveling officer shouting in the corridor, the meaning of the words is nothing more than that I have already dewormed the cat, why is it still diarrhea?
For such a shoveler, the veterinarian still explained to her in a kind way, this is because although the cat has done deworming before, there is a parasite that is very tenacious and is still making waves in the cat's body.
The name of this parasite is called trichomoniasis.
Maybe some of the shovelers have heard the name of this parasite, and some haven't heard of it. And this parasite is related to the topic I want to talk about today.
The cat finished deworming and had diarrhea. Some shovelers feel that since they have expelled the worms, there is no need to consider the parasite factor anymore. But in reality, a parasite called trichomoniasis is likely to survive and continue to torment the cat.
1. What is a trichomoniasis?
From the perspective of cat pathology, the most susceptible trichomoniasis in cats is Trichomonas fetalis, also known as Trichomonas bovis. It is a single-celled, flagellar protozoa that generally parasitizes the colon of cats.
The way of transmission of trichomoniasis between cats is usually through fecal mouth and urine transmission, and food and water contaminated with feces can spread trichomoniasis. Trichomoniasis has a survival ability of more than 30 to 60 minutes in water, close to 3 hours in the cat's urine, and only 1 to 2 hours in the cat can.
Cat pathologist Stockdale once did a survey in which nearly 3 adults of the 117 cats he surveyed had trichomoniasis present. That is to say, trichomoniasis infection is a negligible phenomenon in cats.
2. Symptoms of trichomoniasis infection
If a cat is infected with trichomoniasis, it will clinically manifest as a case of drip, fecal incontinence, and even prolapse. In addition, there have been some reports that cats infected with trichomoniasis will experience symptoms of anorexia and depression.
Diarrhea caused by infection with trichomoniasis has some typical features. For example, diarrhea caused by trichomoniasis is large intestinal diarrhea rather than small intestinal diarrhea.
Next, I will talk about the difference between enteric diarrhea and small intestinal diarrhea. First of all, small intestinal diarrhea has more stool, and the stool is mixed with fat and less mucus. The amount of stool in large intestinal diarrhea is small, pus and blood can also be seen in the flesh, and there is a lot of mucus.
Secondly, the frequency of bowel diarrhea is generally 2 to 3 times the normal frequency, while the number of intestinal diarrhea is relatively more, which can reach more than 5 times the normal frequency.
Finally, intestinal diarrhea can cause a sharp weight loss in the cat, while enterolar diarrhea has little effect on the cat's weight.
Yes, once a cat is infected with fetal trichomonas, the most obvious symptoms are diarrhea and bloody stools. This will also make many shovelers exclaim: "Why did I obviously deworm the cat, but it is still diarrhea?" ”
We now know the answer to this question, but it inevitably raises new questions: Why is there no way to eliminate the fetal trichomonas by the deworming that we shovelers usually do?
Why does deworming work on it?
In my opinion, there are two main reasons why general deworming cannot eliminate fetal trichomonas.
1. Strong resistance
As we can see earlier, the viability of fetal trichomonas is not strong compared to other parasites. The lowest survival time in the water is only 30 minutes, and the highest record in other environments is only a few tens of hours.
However, compared with other parasites, Trichomoniasis fetalis has a very big advantage, that is, it has strong resistance to some conventional deworming drugs. When deworming, other parasites have died under the action of drugs, but the fetal trichomonas are standing tall, and when the effect of the drug has passed, they have begun to make waves again.
So if the cat is infected with fetal trichomonas at the beginning, there is no way to eradicate it by relying on general deworming alone.
2. Lack of inspection means
First of all, the fetal trichomonas have a public face, and in the basic examination, even professionals can easily confuse them with other parasites. According to a 2015 report by the American Veterinary Medical Association, there were quite a few cases in which cats were infected with fetal trichomonas, which could be judged to be giardia infection in the first round of testing.
If no one recognizes that the cat is actually infected with trichomoniasis, then the subsequent deworming will naturally not think of targeted treatment. In this way, the fetal trichomonas survived.
Secondly, as far as the current level of medical care is concerned, ordinary tests cannot detect fetal Trichomonas. For example, the most commonly used stool test, because of the confusing appearance of trichomoniasis and the limitations of the test itself, resulting in a very low detection rate.
Like PCR detection, although the correct rate of detecting trichomoniasis has reached 95%, this detection technology is currently only popular in Europe and the United States, and it is rarely seen in China.
In the absence of such detection methods, those tenacious trichomoniasis may become fish that slip through the net.
4. What should the shoveler do?
1. Check again
As mentioned earlier, fetal trichomonas are easily mistaken for Giardia, so when the shoveler finds that the cat still has diarrhea after the insect is expelled or the drug has no effect, it should be checked again with the cat.
The most recommended test is pcr testing, if there is no such technology in the pet clinic, the shoveler can also ask the veterinarian to perform smear testing. The latter is not as effective and accurate as the former, but it is also an alternative in emergency situations.
2. Put in the treatment
If it is finally confirmed that the cat is indeed infected with fetal trichomonas, the doctor will prescribe the relevant drugs. However, here we should remind you that because the life force of the trichomoniasis is strong, the corresponding drugs will also have strong lethality, which may affect the cat. Therefore, when choosing a treatment plan, we must be cautious and cautious.
3. Usually prevention
Regarding the usual prevention, the shoveler must do the following:
Avoid exposing cats to snails, slugs' food, as these organisms are a high source of infection that carries trichomoniasis.
Cleaning and replacing the cat litter must be diligent, and the cat's excrement must also be shoveled off in time.
After the cats have come into contact with some unknown objects, be sure to help them clean their bodies.
Keep the home environment dry and ventilated, and disinfect it every once in a while.
As I said at the beginning, if the shovelers have not encountered similar problems, they are lucky. But what we have to do as shovelers is to plan ahead, to be lucky, and to be prepared to grasp with both hands.
参考文献：[1]levy m g, gookin j l, poore m, et al. tritrichomonas foetus and not pentatrichomonas hominis is the etiologic agent of feline trichomonal diarrhea[j]. journal of parasitology, 2003, 89(1): 99-105. [2]van der saag, m, mcdonell, d, slapeta, j. cat genotype tritrichomonas foetus survives passage through the alimentary tract of two common slug species. vet parasitol 2011; 177: 262–266. Li Yanyan,An Qin,Liu Jiajia,Zhang Bin. Research progress on common parasitic diseases in dogs and cats and their control drugs[j].Hunan Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Medicine, 2018(06):32-34. [4]lalor s l, gunn-moore d a. effects of concurrent ronidazole and probiotic therapy in cats with tritrichomonas foetus-associated diarrhoea[j]. j feline med surg, 2012, 14: 650-658.
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