Infectious canine hepatitis (ICH) is an acute and highly contagious septicemic disease of dogs caused by adenovirus type I, characterized by hemorrhagic gastroenteritis, circulatory disorders, hepatic centrilobular necrosis, and Liver parenchyma and endothelial cells are characterized by the appearance of intranuclear inclusions.

【Pathogen and Epidemiology】

1. Pathogen: Canine Type Ⅰ Adenovirus , also known as canine infectious hepatitis virus, belongs to the Adenoviridae family, mammalian adenovirus genus, double-stranded DNA virus. Mainly through the digestive tract infection, but also vertical transmission.

2. Source of infection: infected dogs and dogs with poison, detoxify through secretions and excretions such as tears, saliva, feces and urine, and pollute the surrounding environment, feed and utensils.

3. Susceptible animals: mainly dogs and foxes, with no breed, age and gender differences, but more common in puppies under 1 year old, and puppies soon after weaning. The highest rate and mortality, adult dogs generally show latent infection. Recovered dogs can obtain lifelong immunity, but the virus can survive in the kidneys and can be detoxified through urine for 6 to 9 months, which is an important foci of infection in healthy dogs.

[Symptoms]

The incubation period of the disease is 6 to 9 days. Some of the most acute puppies have a high initial body temperature and a high degree of depression. Other symptoms may lead to death within 1 to 2 days.

1. Symptoms similar to colds: Most of the canines have symptoms like an acute cold at first, with elevated body temperature, depression, loss of appetite, a little serous or mucous secretions in the eyes and nose, but no cough symptoms.

2. Gastrointestinal symptoms: Vomiting, jam-like stool or bloody diarrhea are the main symptoms of this disease, and bleeding spots or bleeding spots on the gums are the important symptoms of this disease.

3. Other symptoms: Many dogs have distended abdomens, thoracoabdominal puncture can remove a lot of cool, light red liquid, and the xiphoid cartilage is sensitive and painful when touched. Many affected dogs develop proteinuria. In some dogs, the cornea of one or both eyes is cloudy during the recovery period, and seems to be covered by a light blue film, which is called hepatitic blue eye, and the cornea turns transparent after a few days.

【Diagnosis】

This disease should be suspected based on clinical symptoms, but be careful to be associated with canine distemper, parvovirus enteritis, cold or traumatic corneal opacity etc. to identify. Compared with canine distemper, this disease has no symptoms of respiratory and nervous system infections; compared with parvovirus enteritis, both have symptoms of bloody diarrhea, but parvovirus infection does not have gingival bleeding spots, plaques, and no abdominal swelling; and Compared with colds, there are no symptoms of respiratory tract infection, but gastrointestinal infection symptoms; compared with traumatic corneal opacity, the corneal surface of hepatitis blue eye is smooth and there is no trace of trauma, while dogs with pure traumatic corneal opacity have no body temperature Systemic symptoms such as elevation and gastrointestinal infection.

The necropsy of the deceased dog showed that the liver was slightly enlarged, the gallbladder wall was edema, the small intestine was bleeding, and there was a lot of cool, light red fluid in the thoracic and abdominal cavity. Histological changes showed that the liver parenchyma was degenerated to varying degrees, and there were intranuclear inclusion bodies in hepatocytes and sinusoidal endothelial cells. At present, there is no clinical rapid diagnostic test strip for this disease, and there are many laboratory diagnostic methods, mainly including micro-blood coagulation and hemagglutination inhibition test, fluorescent antibody test and PCR method.

【Treatment】

Early use of high-dose anti-canine adenovirus type 1 or 2 hyperimmune serum, while focusing on liver protection and control of bleeding symptoms .

Hepatoprotective measures can try Gan Ganling (Shandougen) injection, inosine injection, VB6 and so on. Due to the lack of synthesis of coagulation factors in the liver due to this disease, the platelets are significantly reduced, so conventional hemostatic drugs are often ineffective. wait for treatment.

【Prognosis】

Due to the damage caused by the virus to the liver and small blood vessel endothelial cells, it is generally difficult to control the bleeding symptoms of dogs with conventional drugs, and eventually they become ill. Most puppies die from severe anemia and dehydration. Adult dogs can usually tolerate it, mostly recover within 2 weeks, and develop strong immunity.

[Prevention]

Since recovered dogs can be detoxified for a long time through their urine, they should be avoided with healthy dogs and in groups. For susceptible dogs, a series of domestic or imported dog vaccines can be used for immunization. For the method, see Canine Distemper Prevention.