DIAGNOSIS OF RETROVIROSIS IN SHELTER CATS: CLINICAL MANIFESTATIONS AND QUANTIFICATION OF FELV PROVIRAL DNA
cat, retrovirus, shelter, PCR
A total of 115 cats were included in the study. Of these, 65 (56.52%) were females and 50 (43.48%) males. As for the reproductive state, 101/115 (87.83%) were castrated and only 14/115 (12.17%) were intact. In the life stage distribution, they had cats in all four age groups. Thirty-four cats (29.57%) were between 0 and 1 year old, 59 (51.3%) between 1 and 6 years old, 19 cats (16.52%) between 7 and 10 years old and only 3 cats (2, 61%) over 11 years old. In the body score evaluation, 46.08 (53/115) of the cats had ideal weight, 6.96% (8/115) were below ideal weight and 46.95% (54/115) were above ideal weight. In the screening test, 46.96% (54/115), less than half of the animals, were negative for both retroviruses. And the positive result for the leukemia virus was 18.26% (21/115) and for the immunodeficiency virus 56.52% (65/115). Cats co-infected for both retroviruses represented a total value of only 8.7% (10/115). No association was found for sex and body score between the groups of cats divided according to the status of retroviruses by the screening test. However, Fisher's Exact test revealed p value < 0.001, and demonstrated that the number of castrated cats is significantly higher in all groups than the number of intact cats. In the age group analysis, cats with up to 1 year of age and negative result for FIV and FeLV were significantly higher than in cats positive for the Feline Immunodeficiency Retrovirus by the Kruskall-Wallis test with p value < 0.001)