Peer-reviewed veterinary case report
How common are distemper antibodies in healthy adult dogs
By Bergmann, Michèle et al.·Published in Viruses·2021·Clinic of Small Animal Medicine, Germany·View original on PubMed →
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Original publication title: Prevalence of Neutralizing Antibodies to Canine Distemper Virus and Response to Vaccination in Client-Owned Adult Healthy Dogs.
- Species:
- dog
Plain-English summary
A group of 97 healthy adult dogs were vaccinated against canine distemper virus (CDV) to check their antibody levels before and after the shot. Most of the dogs (94.8%) already had antibodies before vaccination, but none of them showed an increase in antibodies after receiving the vaccine. Interestingly, five dogs did not have any detectable antibodies before or after the vaccination. The study suggests that instead of routinely re-vaccinating adult dogs, checking their antibody levels might be a better approach.
People also search for: dog distemper vaccination response · why is my dog not responding to vaccine · adult dog vaccine antibody test
Abstract
Re-vaccinations against canine distemper virus (CDV) are commonly performed in 3-year intervals. The study's aims were to determine anti-CDV antibodies in healthy adult dogs within 28 days of vaccination against CDV, and to evaluate factors associated with the presence of pre-vaccination antibodies and with the antibody response to vaccination. Ninety-seven dogs, not vaccinated within 1 year before enrollment, were vaccinated with a modified live CDV vaccine. A measurement of the antibodies was performed before vaccination (day 0), on day 7, and 28 after the vaccination by virus neutralization. A response to vaccination was defined as a ≥4-fold titer increase by day 28. Fisher's exact test was used to determine factors associated with a lack of antibodies and vaccination response. In total, 94.8% of the dogs (92/97; CI 95%: 88.2-98.1) had antibodies (≥10) prior to vaccination. A response to vaccination was not observed in any dog. Five dogs were considered humoral non-responders; these dogs neither had detectable antibodies before, nor developed antibodies after vaccination. Young age (<2 years) was significantly associated with a lack of pre-vaccination antibodies (= 0.018; OR: 26.825; 95% CI: 1.216-1763.417). In conclusion, necessity of re-vaccination in adult healthy dogs should be debated and regular vaccinations should be replaced by antibody detection.
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Search related cases →Original publication on PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34065493/