Peer-reviewed veterinary case report
Kittens with and without parasites respond to panleukopenia vaccine
By Weidinger, Anna-Karina et al.·Published in Journal of feline medicine and surgery·2024·LMU Small Animal Clinic, Germany·View original on PubMed →
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Original publication title: Antibody response after feline panleukopenia virus vaccination in kittens with and without intestinal parasites.
- Species:
- cat
Plain-English summary
A group of 74 healthy kittens received vaccinations against feline panleukopenia virus (FPV) to see how well they responded, even if they had intestinal parasites. Out of these, 17 kittens had parasites, but both groups showed a good immune response to the vaccine. In fact, the kittens with parasites had a slightly higher rate of antibody increase after vaccination compared to those without. This suggests that having intestinal parasites doesn’t affect the effectiveness of the FPV vaccine, so there’s no need to delay vaccinations if your kitten has a mild parasitic infection.
People also search for: kitten vaccination response · feline panleukopenia vaccine effectiveness · do intestinal parasites affect kitten vaccines
Abstract
OBJECTIVES: Vaccinations should only be given to healthy cats, and deworming before vaccination is generally recommended; however, so far, no study has investigated the influence of intestinal parasitic infection on the immune response in kittens. The aim of this prospective study was to compare the antibody response to feline panleukopenia virus (FPV) vaccination in kittens with and without intestinal parasites. METHODS: Overall, 74 healthy kittens were included. Of these, 17 had intestinal parasites (12/17, 6/17, 1/17species). Both kittens with and without (n = 57) parasites received two primary kitten vaccinations with modified live FPV vaccines in a 4-week interval starting at the age of 8-12 weeks. Anti-FPV antibodies were determined at the beginning of the study (week 0) and at week 8 (4 weeks after the second vaccination) by haemagglutination inhibition. A ⩾four-fold titre increase (week 8 vs week 0) was defined as a response to vaccination. Comparison of the immune response in the kittens with and without intestinal parasites was performed using Pearson's χtest. RESULTS: Pre-vaccination antibodies were present in 4/17 (23.5%) kittens with intestinal parasites and in 24/57 (42.1%) without parasites. A ⩾four-fold titre increase was seen in 13/17 (76.5%) kittens with parasites compared with 32/57 (56.1%) kittens without parasites. There was neither a significant difference in pre-vaccination antibodies ( = 0.17), nor in vaccination response ( = 0.13) between kittens with and without parasites. CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE: The results indicate that asymptomatic intestinal infections with endoparasites do not interfere with the immune response to kitten vaccination series. Parasitic infection (at least with,andspecies) is therefore not a reason to postpone important vaccinations.
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Search related cases →Original publication on PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/39212546/