Incidence of parvo viral enteritis and electro cardiographic alterations in the affected dogs

A case control study was conducted at small animal medicine unit of Teaching Veterinary clinical complex, Rajiv Gandhi college of Veterinary and Animal Sciences, Puducherry for the period of 3 months. Total of nine dogs exhibiting signs of vomiting and diarrhoea that were brought to the hospital were utilized for the study. Nine age-matched dogs brought to the clinic for vaccination / routine check-up that were apparently normal were taken as a control group. The disease was predominantly noticed in dogs between 0 to 6 months old. The disease group showed the prevalence of infection about 45% in non-descript dogs and 56% male dogs which was due to over representation of this breed and sex to the hospital. The current study was conducted for the determination of electrocardiographic alterations in dogs with parvo viral enteritis (PVE) infection. The Electrocardiographic findings (Lead II, 50 mm/sec, 1 cm = 1 mv) were, the QRS complexes of the infected group were normal in width but showed a low R wave amplitude (<0.5 mv) that is low voltage QRS complexes indicates Pericardial effusion because of sepsis. There was a reduction in QT interval (< 0.16 sec) which indicates loss of chloride and potassium ions due to prolonged vomiting and diarrhoea and presence of elevated S-T segment indicates myocardial hypoxia and Pericarditis. Nine suspected samples were positive using H primer pair generated PCR product of 630 bp.