Placentitis Could be Detected Early with Hormone Testing

Researchers believe that estrogens could prove to be a useful early indicator of placentitis in the future.
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Equine placentitis is subtle in its onset, often causing the death of its victim—the unborn foal—before veterinarians can detect and treat it. Equipping veterinarians to identify these cases of placental infection early could help them prevent abortions, lost time on the breeding calendar, and the general heartbreak that can come with losing a foal.

A research team recently looked at whether two plasma estrogen concentrations could be potential diagnostic markers for early ascending placentitis. Barry A. Ball, DVM, PhD, Dipl ACT, presented the team’s findings at the 2013 American Association of Equine Practitioners’ Convention, held Dec. 7-11 in Nashville, Tenn.

The two estrogens they evaluated—estrone sulfate and 17β-estradiol sulfate—naturally circulate at high levels in pregnant mares with and without experimentally induced placentitis, so the researchers sought to determine if these hormones’ concentrations could be used to detect infection. The team checked the mares’ hormone levels at Day 0 (before experimental infection in the test group) and then daily for six days.

The found that estrone sulfate levels did not differ between the groups. However, 17β-estradiol sulfate levels dropped significantly within one day of inoculation in the mares with placentitis

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Written by:

Christy Corp-Minamiji, DVM, practices large animal medicine in Northern California, with particular interests in equine wound management and geriatric equine care. She and her husband have three children, and she writes fiction and creative nonfiction in her spare time.

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