Preventing Polio

Last night was a learning experience here at BTCB, we had our first case of polio in one of our younger does that were just weaned. We had a three month old doe who had been stressed, we planed on feeding her out until she is ready to be bred and sold as a breeding doe. Therefore she was switched from an expensive show feed to a commercial feed lacking thymine.

Thankfully we have access to some outstanding vets in Cheyenne who helped us get her up and going at 11 at night. Last night we learned A) the value of carefully examining you animals regular to help accurately diagnose and care for your livestock and B) how common polio is and how it should be prevented as well as treated.

So what is Polio? The official name for Goat Polio is "Polioencephalomalacia". Polio is a nutritional /metabolic disease that affects ruminants. Metabolic means relating to metabolism, the whole range of biochemical processes that occur within the goat's rumen. In ruminant animals that means processing the food the goat has eaten. This disease has become more prominent in goats in the U.S. that are fed more concentrated feeds to help them to grow faster, which includes goats we are raising for market.

The main cause of this disease is either a thiamine deficiency or the stopping of the thiamine activity in the rumen. Thiamine, or vitamin B1, is a major part of the rumen processing that occurs with carbohydrates and amino acid in the rumen. Decreased processing activity leads to cell death in the brain and swelling from excessive accumulation of watery fluid in brain cells and tissues. The symptoms originate from the damage to the brain. The thiamine is produced in sufficient amounts by specific bacteria in the goat's rumen. Any changes in the normal environment in the rumen may lead to reduced production of thiamine in the rumen.

What are the causes of polio? There is a wide variety of things that can cause the rumen to not produce the required thiamine. Things that may trigger this are feeding an excessive concentrate feed and suddenly changing feed, feeding moldy feeds, the drug Thiabendazole which is an active ingredient in some wormer medication (the antibiotic is used for killing bad bacteria but may also kill the good bacteria in the rumen that helps process the feed that results in thiamine) overdosing of Amprolium which is an ingredant in medication such as CORID for prevention of coccidiosis (Amprlium is a thiamine analog, competitively inhibits the active transport of thiamine), and finally Feeding horse type of sweet feed with high molasses content.

The Signs of Goat Polio

• Depression

• Not eating and/or diarrhea

• Early neurologic dysfunction such as

• excitability

• elevation of the head

• staring off into space

• aimless wandering

• circling

• muscle tremors

• apparent blindness

• As the disease progresses

• Involuntary eye movement

• extensor rigidity - the muscles that extends or straightens a limb or body part

• convulsions

The diagnosis of goat polio is early signs of depression and diarrhea. If the animal is not close to kidding, you can rule out the pregnancy toxemia but pregnant does may be effect by pregnancy toxemia with signs resembling polio. Goats may also be effected by blindness and/or extensor rigidity, these are strong symptoms for goat polio. The extensor rigidity is also a sign of tetanus. If the animal is circling, that is also a sign of listeriosis. The best thing to consider is what lead up to the symptoms and quickly watching for any signs of blindness. Look at the list of what can cause the goat polio and consider if any of them have occurred recently. Also, it will not hurt to treat an animal with tetnus or listeriosis with the treatment for goat polio.

The only effective treatment for polio is thiamine or vitamin B1. Thiamine is a prescription only medication and must come from your vet. How well the animal will respond is dependant upon the severity of the disease at the time the animal was treated. The recommended dosage according to the "Goat Medicine" book is 10 mg/kg b.w. repeated every 6 hours for 24 hours. It is recommended that the initial dose be given intravenously and the rest given under the skin or in the muscle.

You need to be careful on the dosage because the thiamine comes in different strengths and the cc's given change according to the bottle you get.

Here is a link to info on understanding how to convert medicine to proper dosage.

The dosage for B1 (thiamine) is 500 mg per 100 weight every six hours, so check any B vit. to make sure you give your goat enough of the B1, and as you say overdosing will not hurt them, they urinate out what they don't need. Usually have to give this amount, every six hours, for a week at least. Sometimes improvement is immediate and sometimes it takes at least a week. Consider keeping Fortified B on hand at all times because vet may not have Thiamine. Fortified B has 100 mg per cc of B1 in it. It can be given orally but the first day but I inject under the skin to make sure they get enough.

We hope this information will be useful and allows you to be well prepared if you encounter any cases of polio in your herd!

Information fromhttp://www.jackmauldin.com/goat_polio.html