PSEUDOMEMBRANOUS (CROUPOUS) ENTERITIS IN SHEEP.
Causes: As in cattle, draughts in folds, overfeeding. Symptoms: fever, inappetence, weakness of hind parts, diarrhœa, tenesmus, false membranes, blood in stools, tympany. Treatment: change diet of dam, exercise, Glauber salts, potassium iodide, bismuth, flaxseed, elm bark, mallow, gum, carminatives, bitters, antiseptics.
Causes. The same causes are claimed as for cattle. Clavel attributed it to too rich milk, and exposure to cold draughts, in folded lambs.
Symptoms. To the general symptoms of fever are added refusal of the teat, weakness or paresis of the hind limbs, looseness of the bowels and the ejection of false membranes with an unusual amount of straining. The dejections may be watery and mixed with blood. In some cases defecation is suppressed, the intestines being blocked by the membranes, and then acute indigestion and fatal tympany may follow.
The pathological anatomy and lesions resemble those seen in the ox.
Treatment. Change the diet of the ewe, and allow more outdoor exercise. Give the lamb Glauber salts (½ to 1 oz.) with potassium iodide (10 grs.), and bismuth (1 dr.). Decoctions of flaxseed, or solutions of elm bark, mallow or gum arabic are desirable, and infusions of aromatic plants or oils of peppermint, anise, or fennel may be added with quinia. As in the other animals such antiseptics as salol, naphthol, naphthalin, boric acid, or salicylate of soda may be administered.
PSEUDOMEMBRANOUS (CROUPOUS) ENTERITIS IN DOGS.
Complication of other diseases like distemper. Symptoms: fever, retching, vomiting, tense, tender, tympanitic abdomen, irregular bowels, false membranes. Lesions: stomach empty, congested, croupous exudate, extravasations. Treatment: sodium sulphate, boric acid, sodium salicylate, salol, bismuth, by mouth or enema, strychnia, vermifuges.
In dogs the formation of false membranes on the intestinal mucosa seems to have less of an individual character, and is found associated with other affections, like canine distemper and parasitism. In the absence, however, of accurate knowledge of the specific cause of croupous enteritis in other animals it seems permissible for the present, to arrange the whole in one class characterized by the presence of false membranes.
Symptoms. Along with the general symptoms of fever and the special ones of the existing specific disease there is more or less disturbance of the digestive organs, anorexia, vomiting, tense, tender, perhaps tympanitic abdomen, irregularity of the bowels and the passage of the false membranes. A morose disposition and tendency to snap has been noticed by Röll.