Blood- and vector-borne bacteria (VBB) can cause severe pathology and even be lethal for dogs in many regions across the globe. Accurate characterization of all the bacterial pathogens infecting a canine host is critical, as coinfections are common and emerging and novel pathogens that may go undetected by traditional diagnostics frequently arise.

BACKGROUND CASE PRESENTATION Canine Hepatozoonosis is a tickborne disease caused by Five dogs aged between five months to seven years apicomplexan haemoprotozoan parasites of the Genus recently diagnosed with different disease conditions Hepatozoon. Two species of hepatozoons, namely presented to Veterinary Teaching Hospital, Peradeniya Hepatozoon canis (H. canis) and Hepatozoon with paresis, chronic emaciation, muscular pain, had americanum (H. amaricanum) are known to infect dogs Hepatozoon like gamonts (4-12%) in the peripheral (Baneth et al., 2003). Of these two species, H.canis circulation. Though H.canis is commonly known to cause transmitted by the brown dog tick Rhipicephalus clinically inapparent infection, the clinical sanguineus is reported in Asian countries whereas H. manifestations, haematological parameters, serum amaricanum transmitted by Amblyomma maculatum is alkaline phosphate (ALP) levels and response to treatment limited to Southern United States. Comparatively, latter is of those five patients were evaluated to identify the factors known to cause severe infection characterized by which complicated the clinical presentation. exostosis and myositis (Vincent-Johnson et al. 1997). Signalements, clinical manifestations and the medical history of the five patients are given in Table 1. When first recognized in India in 1905, it was believed that H. canis only cause a milder disease resulting in Two of the five patients (patient 1 and 2) had been anaemia and lethargy (Vincent-Johnson et al. 1997). recently treated with immunosuppressive doses of However, it was later found out that certain factors corticosteroids. Third patient was on long-term including immunosuppression and co-infections can lead antimicrobial therapy (over five months) and the fourth to severe clinical manifestations due to Hepatozoonosis. A patient was on long term pancreatin. More than 4% (4n u m b e r o f n o n s p e c i f i c h a e m a t o l o g i c a l a n d 12%) of the neutrophils in peripheral blood contained haemochemical changes including non-regenerative capsule like gamonts (Figure 1). Multiplex polymerase a n a e m i a , t h r o m b o c y t o p e n i a , n e u t r o p h i l i a , chain reaction (PCR) was performed as described in hyperproteinaemia, hypoalbuminaemia, polyclonal Kledmanee et al. (2009) in order to determine whether the gammopathy, and elevated serum creatine kinase (CK) clinical complications were due to concurrent infection and alkaline phosphatase (ALP) have been seen in dogs with Ehrlichia canis or Babesia species. Electrophoresis infected with H. canis (O'Dwye et al., 2006). The of PCR amplicons confirmed Hepatozoon canis as the detection of capsule-like gammonts in the cytoplasm of Hepatozoon species observed in peripheral blood and the the neutrophils in blood smears is routinely used to dogs were not concurrently infected with E. canis or diagnose hepatozoonosis. Molecular diagnostic Babesia (Figure 2). techniques, such as polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and sequencing are important for species ...

The aim of the study was to identify canine parvovirus type 2 (CPV-2) subtypes circulating among a selected population of domestic dogs and cats in Sri Lanka and to investigate the evolutionary patterns among Sri Lankan viruses in the context of contemporary global CPV-2 sequences. Altogether, 40/61 (65.6%) samples tested were positive for CPV-2 DNA, including 31/48 (64.6%) dogs and 9/13 (69%) cats. All three subtypes (CPV-2a, CPV-2b and CPV-2c) were detected, with CPV-2a being most common. International median joining haplotype network of 291 CPV-2 sequences suggested that there was little barrier for CPV-2 moving between different geographical regions worldwide, including Sri Lanka, and that there was no correlation between the genetic structure within the molecular network and the decade of sample collection. By contrast, there was correlation between CPV-2 subtype and genetic structure, both within the international network and within the network built from 31 Sri Lankan CPV-2 sequences only. The structure within the latter was not correlated with the location of the veterinary clinic where the samples were submitted, the age or species of the host. Altogether, we have shown that there is considerable variability of CPV-2 genotypes circulating in Sri Lanka, which is likely driven by both local evolution and introduction from other countries. The similarity of CPV-2 obtained from cats and dogs suggests that cats may play a role in the epidemiology of CPV-2 in Sri Lanka.