Abstract
Introduction: Diarrhea is the most common cause of death in neonatal calves. The most important agents of diarrhea in young calves include bacteria, viruses, and protozoa. Only limited attention has been paid to the role of fungi in calves’ diarrhea. Case Presentation: We report on a neonatal calf with fungal diarrhea caused by Candida albicans. The calf has had dysentery in the previous 10 days despite good appetite. The calf was then treated with oxytetracycline tabulations for 5 days. Conclusions: Yeasts and molds are sometimes associated with lesions in the stomach or intestines of scouring calves, but there is very limited information about their role in calf diarrhea. In this study, C. albicans was isolated in a 15-day-old dysenteric calf. These organisms are not a primary cause of diarrhea in calves, but like in children, they are possibly opportunistic pathogens that proliferate and invade the intestinal mucosa following antibiotic therapy.
Highlights
Diarrhea is the most common cause of death in neonatal calves
There are some difficulties in the interpretation of laboratory results in of calves’ diarrhea because some fecal bacterial isolates such, as E. coli or C. perfringens, are normal intestinal flora in most calves with infectious diarrhea [14]
Clinicians use the findings from clinical signs, stool exams and stool culture, and the age of onset of diarrhea to determine the most likely cause of the diarrhea problem
Summary
Diarrhea is the most common cause of death in neonatal calves. The most important agents of diarrhea in young calves include bacteria, viruses, and protozoa. Diarrhea is the most common cause of death in neonatal calves [1, 2]. There are a variety of causes of diarrhea in young calves [2], most of which are infectious agents [3,4,5].
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