Prevalence of serum antibodies against Bartonella species in the serum of cats with or without uveitis.

Bartonella henselae has been implicated as a causative agent of chronic uveitis in people and in some cats. The objective of this study was to determine whether Bartonella species seroprevalence or titer magnitude varies among cats with uveitis, cats without ocular diseases recorded and healthy cats, while controlling for age and risk of flea exposure based on state of residence. There was no difference in seroprevalence rates or titer magnitude between cats with uveitis and cats with non-ocular diseases. Healthy cats were more likely to be seropositive for Bartonella species than cats with uveitis. The median Bartonella species titer was 1:64 for all groups, although healthy cats were more likely to have higher titers than cats with uveitis and cats with non-ocular disease. The results suggest that serum antibody tests alone cannot be used to document clinical uveitis associated with Bartonella species infection.

Effect of topical ophthalmic application of cidofovir on experimentally induced primary ocular feline herpesvirus-1 infection in cats.

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the efficacy of twice-daily ophthalmic application of 0.5% cidofovir solution in cats with experimentally induced primary ocular feline herpesvirus-1 (FHV-1) infection. ANIMALS: Twelve 6-month-old sexually intact male cats. PROCEDURES: Cats were randomly assigned to either a treatment or control group. Ocular infection with FHV-1 was induced (day 0) in all cats via inoculation of both eyes with 10(4) plaque-forming units of a plaque-purified FHV-1 field strain. Twice daily for 10 days beginning on day 4 after virus inoculation, the treatment group received 1 drop of 0.5% cidofovir in 1% carboxymethylcellulose in both eyes, and the control group received 1 drop of 1% carboxymethylcellulose in both eyes. A standardized scoring method was used to evaluate clinical signs of FHV-1 infection in each cat once daily for 24 days. The amount of ocular viral shedding was assessed by use of a quantitative real-time PCR procedure every 3 days during the study period. Clinical scores and viral quantification were averaged over the pretreatment (days 0 to 3), treatment (days 4 to 14), and posttreatment (days 15 to 24) periods for each cat. RESULTS: During the treatment period, clinical scores and amount of viral ocular shedding were significantly lower in the treatment group, compared with findings in the control group. CONCLUSIONS AND CLINICAL RELEVANCE: Twice-daily application of 0.5% cidofovir solution in both eyes significantly decreased the amount of viral shedding and the severity of clinical disease in cats with experimentally induced ocular FHV-1 infection.

Bartonella species, feline herpesvirus-1, and Toxoplasma gondii PCR assay results from blood and aqueous humor samples from 104 cats with naturally occurring endogenous uveitis.

Toxoplasma gondii, Bartonella henselae and feline herpesvirus-1 (FHV-1) have been implicated as causative agents in feline uveitis. The usefulness of serum and aqueous humor (AH) antibody testing for these agents is limited as antibodies can be detected in both healthy cats and cats with uveitis. Very few studies using polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assays to amplify organism DNA from samples from cats with uveitis have been performed. In this study, assays to detect T gondii antibodies, feline leukemia virus antigen, feline immunodeficiency virus antibody, and Bartonella species antibodies were performed on serum and PCR assays for amplification of T gondii, Bartonella species, and FHV-1 DNA were performed on blood and AH samples from 104 cats with endogenous uveitis and 19 healthy cats. Results suggest the addition of the PCR assay to the diagnostic work-up for cats with uveitis will increase the detection of T gondii and FHV-1; however, the diagnostic usefulness of these additional data is not clear.