Clinical study on Moraxella-associated infectious keratoconjunctivitis (IKC) of small ruminants

Abstract

ARTICLE INFO ABSTRACT Keywords Infectious keratoconjunctivitis (IKC) represents an important health problem in semi-desert and desert areas. The present study tries to investigate the possible role of Moraxella as a causative agent of IKC. A total number of 140 sterile conjunctival swabs from the diseased animals (93 sheep and 47 goats) of different ages showed signs of IKC were subsequently collected, bacteriologically examined to isolate Moraxella spp, which was successively isolated from 19 animals (11 sheep and 8 goats) with infection rate about 13.6%. In relation to age, a higher infection rate (19.2%) was recorded among sheep in the age group ≥ 12 to < 24 months and among goats in the age group ≥ 3 to < 6 months. Antimicrobial sensitivity test of obtained isolates revealed that Moraxella was 100% sensitive to Ciprofloxacin, Gentamicin, and Tylosin, and 79% to Oxytetracycline. All tested isolates were resistant to Vancomycin, Ampicillin plus Sulbactam, and Sulfamethoxazole plus Trimethoprim. Therapeutically, two therapeutic regimens were carried out to treat the diseased cases under field conditions and the results were illustrated in detail. Infectious keratoconjunctivitis Moraxella small ruminants Antimicrobial sensitivity test and field therapeutic trials