Peer-reviewed veterinary case report
Erythroleukemia in two 1-year-old cats with feline leukemia virus
By Shimada, T et al.·Published in The Journal of veterinary medical science·1995·Department of Veterinary Clinical Pathobiology, Japan·View original on PubMed →
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Original publication title: Erythroleukemia in two cats naturally infected with feline leukemia virus in the same household.
- Species:
- cat
Plain-English summary
Two 1-year-old cats from the same household were diagnosed with a rare blood cancer called erythroleukemia after being infected with feline leukemia virus (FeLV). The male cat initially had a condition called myelodysplastic syndrome, which can lead to leukemia, while the female cat developed the same cancer after close contact with him. Both cats showed abnormal growth of immature blood cells in their bone marrow. They were treated with a chemotherapy drug called daunomycin, which helped somewhat but did not completely eliminate the cancer. This situation highlights the risks of FeLV, especially in cats living together.
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Abstract
Erythroleukemia was observed in two unrelated cats infected with feline leukemia virus (FeLV) from the same household. Case 1, a 1-year-old neutered male cat developed erythroleukemia (M6) after a diagnosis of myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS-Er) on the criteria of FAB classification of acute leukemias. Case 2, a 1-year-old neutered female cat, which had close contact with Case 1, also developed erythroleukemia (M6Er). In both cases, marked proliferation of erythroid progenitor cells with disproportionally large numbers of immature forms was observed in the bone marrow. In Case 1, neoplastic proliferation of myeloid cells in the bone marrow was also noted at the terminal stage. Combination chemotherapy with daunomycin was partially effective for treatment of these erythroid neoplasias, but did not induce complete remission. Southern blot analysis using exogenous FeLV-specific probes indicated the clonal origin of these hematopoietic tumor cells. Furthermore, the erythroid and myeloid tumor cells in Case 1 were shown to be derived from independent transformed clones. A variant FeLV was shown to be integrated into the tumor cells in Case 1, while a full-length FeLV was found in both cases. Because these erythroid neoplastic diseases occurred in two unrelated cats kept in the same household and these diseases are rare, they may both have been associated with the same FeLV strain.
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Search related cases →Original publication on PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/7492633/