Bacterial endocarditis in adult dairy cattle
Power, H.T.; Rebhun, W.C.
Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association 182(8): 806-808
1983
ISSN/ISBN: 0003-1488 PMID: 6343319 Document Number: 197515
Thirty-one cases of bacterial endocarditis in adult dairy cows were reviewed. Clinical signs were reflective of the stage of the disease. Recurrent or persistent fever, tachycardia and a pounding heartbeat or systolic murmur, polypnea, and lameness were typical. In chronic cases, weight loss and poor production developed. The end stage was congestive heart failure. Neutrophilia was typical in early cases. Low-grade anaemia and high total serum globulin content developed with chronicity and seemed to be negative prognostic signs. Corynebacterium pyogenes was the organism most frequently identified by blood culture or PM. Twenty cows were examined PM and two were sent to slaughter. Nine cows in which the diagnosis was made early in the course of the disease responded to long-term penicillin therapy.