The nutritional status affects the complete blood count of goats experimentally infected with Haemonchus contortus

Abstract

BackgroundGastrointestinal nematode (GIN) remains the most important pathogenic constraint of small ruminant production worldwide. The improvement of the host immune response against GIN though breeding for improved animal resistance, vaccination and nutritional supplementation appear as very promising methods. The objective of this study was to investigate the effect of four nutritional status differing in protein and energy levels (Hay: 5.1 MJ/Kg of dry matter (DM) and 7.6% of crude protein (CP), Ban: 8.3 MJ/Kg of DM and 7.5% of CP, Soy: 7.6 MJ/Kg of DM and 17.3% of CP, BS: 12.7 MJ/Kg of DM and 7.4% of CP) on the haematological disturbances due to Haemonchus contortus infection in Creole kid goats.ResultsNo significant effect of the nutritional status was observed for faecal egg count (FEC) but the experimental infection induced haematological disturbances whose intensity and lengthening were dependent on the nutritional status. A transient marked regenerative macrocytic hypochromic anaemia as revealed by a decrease of packed cell volume (PCV), red blood cells (RBC) and hemoglobin and an increase of reticulocytes was observed in all infected groups except Hay. In this latter, the anaemia settled until the end of the experiment. Furthermore, H. contortus induced a thrombocytopenia significantly more pronounced in the group under the lowest nutritional status in term of protein (Hay and Ban). A principal component analysis revealed that the variables that discriminated the nutritional status were the average daily gain (ADG) and the PCV, considered as measures of the level of resilience to H. contortus infection. Moreover, the variables that discriminated infected and non-infected animals were mostly related to the biology of RBC (i.e. size and hemoglobin content) and they were correlated with FEC.ConclusionsThe severity and the lengthening of the regenerative anaemia and the thrombocytopenia induced by H. contortus have been affected by the nutritional status. The protein enriched diets induced resilience to the infection rather than resistance. This suggests that resilience is associated with an improved regenerative capacity of the bone marrow. However, this needs to be further investigated to understand the relationships between resistance, resilience and dietary supplementation.

Effects of Medicinal Plants and Organic Selenium against Ovine Haemonchosis

“…The MCV of the RBCs in our study increased regardless of dietary status and was the highest in the Herbmix group, consistent with our previous results with infected lambs [7]. A similar increase in MCV was reported for Creole goats infected with H. contortus fed four diets with different contents of protein and energy [44]. Clinical signs of haemonchosis such as anemia have been correlated with clinicopathological and parasitological findings and are helpful for detecting and diagnosing H. contortus infections in sheep and goats [47].…”

“…Previous studies of GIN-infected lambs have reported similar results [ 7 , 8 ]. Treatment with Herbmix or organic Se in our study only slightly improved the RBC parameters, even though the intensity and length of hematological disturbances depend on the nutritional status of sheep with haemonchosis [ 44 ]. Treatment with the anthelmintic moxidectin and maize dietary supplementation can return RBC parameters in sheep with haemonchosis to normal levels [ 45 ].…”

Mixed Grazing and Dietary Supplementation Improve the Response to Gastrointestinal Nematode Parasitism and Production Performances of Goats

“…Indeed, although kids of the Control groups showed the same level of parasitism measured through FEC, the supplementation improved significantly the production performances (i.e., BCS, LW, and carcass traits) of kids in this group. This effect of the dietary supplementation was also observed previously in studies showing up to 60% of reduction in the anemia induced by H. contortus infection in kids (30)(31)(32). These results suggest a close interaction between dietary supplementation and the level of parasitism.…”

Effect of the nutritional status of Creole goats on the density-dependent prolificacy of Haemonchus contortus

“…Recently, it has been shown in Creole goat kids that protein overnutrition increased resilience but not resistance to an experimental H. contortus infection by reducing anemia through an increased hematological regeneration capacity of the bone marrow (Ceriac et al, 2017). However, in this study the effect of the nutritional status on the GIN populations was measured only through the FEC and the impact of the experimental H. contortus infection on intake and digestibility was not performed.…”