Immediate postnatal inoculation of a microbial barrier to prevent neonatal diarrhea induced by Clostridium difficile in young conventional and gnotobiotic hares
Dubos, F.; Martinet, L.; Dabard, J.; Ducluzeau, R.
American Journal of Veterinary Research 45(6): 1242-1244
1984
ISSN/ISBN: 0002-9645 PMID: 6742589 Document Number: 228415
The caecal contents of a healthy young hare (a 10-fold dilution prepared in anaerobiosis) were transferred into gnotobiotic recipient mice. The faecal flora of recipient mice was inoculated into 49 ordinary young hares (kept in a closed building) immediately after birth. All the inoculated hares survived until weaning whereas 35% of 48 untreated hares died of diarrhoea. Clostridium difficile and C. perfringens were present in all the diarrhoeal uninoculated hares, whereas these species were present only in half of healthy inoculated or uninoculated hares at low concentrations ( less than 106/g of faeces). A microbial barrier effect against challenge-exposure strains of C. difficile and C. perfringens was present in the intestinal tract of recipient gnotobiotic mice and young hares. The protective effect of the microbial inoculum may have been due to antagonism exerted against C. difficile and C. perfringens in the intestinal tract of inoculated ordinary hares.