Prevalence and clinical pathology of bovine tropical theileriosis in cross-bred population of Ahmednagar district of Maharashtra

A survey based on peripheral blood smear examination of cross-bred cattle for determining the prevalence of Theileria annulata from Ahmednagar district of Maharashtra conducted during May to December 2008 revealed prevalence rate of 5.70%. All the animals had pyrexia & prevalence rate amongst pyrexia cases was 16.66% and level of parasitaemia was < 5%. Pyrexia (100%), presence of ticks on the body (100%), enlargement of prescapular and poplitial lymph nodes (92.30%), anorexia (76.92%), dyspnoea (69.23%) and anaemia (61.59%) were the predominant clinical features noted in the study. Haematological analysis revealed anaemia (70%) of normocytic normochromic type inclining towards normocytic hypochromic. Leucocytosis was seen in 40% cases while leucocytopenia was observed in 20% cases. Differential leucocytic counts revealed either relative lymphocytosis associated with neutropenia or lymphocytopenia associated with neutrophilia. Biochemical analysis revealed bilirubinaemia associated with increase in indirect/unconjugated bilirubin indicating large scale haemolysis in 60% cases. Hypoproteinaemia primarily associated with hypoalbuminaemia, elevated levels of SGOT and SGPT were recorded particularly in severely affected cases indicating liver involvement. The BUN and serum creatinine revealing kidney profile did not show any deviation from the reference values.