Abstract
JFMS
A new high
The JFMS team is celebrating the news, announced by Clarivate on June 30, of the latest (2020) journal impact factor. At 2.015, the impact factor is the highest to date for the AAFP and ISFM’s flagship veterinary journal.
A journal’s impact factor is a calculation of how often an average article is cited in a particular year, and is one of the measures by which the research community and publishers evaluate the impact of the world’s high-quality academic journals relative to the field.
JFMS, published by SAGE, is currently in its 23rd volume, and the latest impact factor sees it ranked 47 out of the 146 titles within the category ‘Veterinary Sciences’, in which it is one of very few journals dedicated to a single species.
Contributing to the impact factor metric were 538 citations (in 2020) relating to a total of 267 articles published in the relevant window (2018 and 2019). Among the top five most highly cited papers (see box) were three discussing novel treatments and diagnostic tests for feline infectious peritonitis; a first study of the behavioural effects of gabapentin in cats – specifically community cats confined in holding cage traps prior to surgical sterilisation; and the AAFP Feline Anesthesia Guidelines, the first exclusively feline anaesthesia guidelines authored by an expert panel.
JFMS’s impact factor from 2006 through to the latest for 2020
International Cat Day 2021 – #BeCatCurious
This year the theme for International Cat Day (ICD) was ‘#BeCatCurious Training Cats and their Humans’ – to encourage cat owners to train their cats to voluntarily enter a carrier and limit the stress of veterinary visits. The theme was chosen by International Cat Care, the custodians of ICD and parent charity of ISFM, and at the time of going to press, ICD 2021 was about to take place on 8 August.
Up to 92% of cats will develop osteoarthritis and joint pain, which is one reason why regular veterinary visits are essential. However, cats with joint conditions need to be handled gently to minimise pain and discomfort, and this can be especially difficult if they are not comfortable using a cat carrier.
As well as the welfare benefits for cats with painful joint conditions, the theme was chosen in response to a wider desire for training advice among cat owners. In a poll conducted by iCatCare, 95% of respondents said they would like more advice on training their cat, with more than half stating they struggle to persuade their cat to enter a cat carrier.
Cat owners could sign up to receive specialist information about kittens, adults or senior cats, followed by a six-step, positive training journey, led by iCatCare behavioural experts Sarah Ellis and Linda Ryan. In addition to content provided by ICD partners Zoetis, Royal Canin and Purina, owners were invited to attend events on ICD. These included:
✜ A live chat with Linda Ryan on anything cat training-related.
✜ A debate, hosted by Sarah Ellis, between feline experts on what makes a carrier cat friendly.
✜ A talk by veterinary experts Nathalie Dowgray and Sam Taylor, discussing what to look out for as cats age.
✜ A discussion about how to adapt the home environment to help an ageing cat be safe and happy, with Nathalie Dowgray and Martha Cannon, a specialist in Feline Medicine representing Zoetis
✜ A talk by Vanessa Tonn, Royal Canin’s Scientific Communications Specialist, explaining how to introduce puzzle feeders to cats.
New videos to help caregivers train cats to use asthma inhalers
iCatCare, in partnership with Trudell Animal Health (designers of asthma chambers for cats [Aerokat], dogs and horses), has created a series of videos to help caregivers train their cat to use an asthma inhaler device calmly, without fear or distress.
Steroids are generally used to treat feline asthma, often in the form of tablets. However, as with people, treatment via an inhaler is preferable as it delivers drugs directly into the lungs and has fewer side effects than tablet therapy.
Inhaler therapy is possible for cats via a special mask that fits a cat’s mouth and nose and a chamber that holds the aerosolised drugs, allowing the cat to inhale the medication over several breaths.
A still from one of the videos shows iCatCare Cat Advocacy Programme Manager Linda Ryan and her cat, Olive, at the stage where Olive voluntarily puts her face into the mask
Teaching a cat to put their head in the apparatus may seem daunting for many caregivers. However, using force will cause the cat to become distressed, which can be particularly detrimental in a cat that is not breathing well.
Being able to use an inhaler positively and in a cat-centred way was therefore the inspiration behind the new series of videos, which are designed to help caregivers to train their cats to use the Aerokat device in a step-by-step format.
iCatCare’s Cat Advocacy Programme Manager, Linda Ryan, trained her cat to accept the inhaler using positive reinforcement, and recorded each stage from start to finish. The process may take some time and requires patience and understanding, but, as treatment will be needed for the cat’s entire lifetime, this initial investment in training is worthwhile.
AAFP
Cat Friendly Certificate Program named best in business
The AAFP’s Cat Friendly Certificate Program continues to earn recognition and praise from industry associations, receiving the 2021 Best in Business Award from Veterinary Medical Association Executives (VMAE). The program truly shined and was a stand-out during the awards ceremony, which took place in July. The VMAE Awards Committee presented the award in recognition of the program’s originality in content, creativity and usefulness to veterinary professionals.
Heather O’Steen, CEO of AAFP, with the award
The AAFP is honored and thrilled with this accolade for the Cat Friendly Certificate Program, which continues to have a positive impact on the veterinary community and advances the standards of feline care.
In May 2021, the program received the 2021 Gold Circle Award from the American Society of Association Executives (ASAE). Both awards recognized the importance of this specialized educational program and what it provides to the industry.
Check out AAFP webinars
AAFP membership provides a source of feline-specific continuing education within the AAFP eLearning Center. Both live and on-demand webinars are available and added throughout the year and are free to members. Non-members can also access the CE. See box on the right to check out some of the recent webinars and take a peek at what is coming up later this year.
AAFP
Feline resources in Spanish and Portuguese
The AAFP is excited to share that the 2021 AAHA / AAFP Feline Life Stage Guidelines are now available in both Portuguese and Spanish. The guideline translations offer veterinarians and veterinary staff an opportunity to combine feline-friendly care approaches with a lifelong healthcare plan to improve the health and wellbeing of their feline patients. The accompanying client brochure, ‘Your Cat’s Life Stages’, as well as other topics in feline care, is also available in Portuguese and Spanish.
The AAFP would like to thank its volunteers for their incredible effort and hard work. The AAFP is excited to continue the growing library of resources and programs, including the Cat Friendly Certificate Program, published in a variety of languages.
ABCD
2021 Young Scientist Award winners
Young veterinary researchers Julia Klaus, of the University of Zurich, VetSuisse Faculty, Switzerland, and Yasmin Parr from the MRC-University of Glasgow, Centre for Virus Research, UK, have received the 2021 European Advisory Board on Cat Diseases (ABCD) Young Scientist Award, funded by Boehringer Ingelheim. Their winning abstracts can be found below and on page 864.
Karin Moestl, Vice President of the ABCD, presented the award during the ISFM World Feline Congress. The winners also displayed posters of their work at the congress (available on demand until the end of the year; icatcare.org/events/ isfm-world-feline-congress to register; or isfmworldfelinecongress. com/isfm2021 if already registered).
Julia Klaus (left) and Yasmin Parr (right) display their certificates
Julia Klaus – ‘SARS-CoV-2 infections in domestic cats – summarising published and ongoing work’
Since the coronavirus disease COVID-19 was first identified in 2020, domestic cats have been demonstrated to be highly susceptible to the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) under experimental conditions.1,2 Sporadic cases of natural SARS-CoV-2 infections in cats have been reported worldwide. 3 Some infected cats showed respiratory or gastrointestinal disease and, in the majority, human-to-feline transmission via close contact with COVID-19 patients was suspected.3-5 As part of my doctoral thesis, I am investigating the prevalence, shedding, transmission routes and viral evolution of SARS-CoV-2 and the disease patterns and immunity of the infection in cats. I collected oropharyngeal, nasal, faecal and fur swabs from cats and environmental samples in COVID-19-affected households. I analysed these, as well as swabs from cats presented to veterinary clinics in Switzerland, Germany and Italy, for the presence of SARS-CoV-2 RNA RT-qPCR targeting the E and RdRp genes was validated in collaboration with Swiss and German reference laboratories. Positive animals were followed by repetitive sampling, serological analysis and viral whole genome sequencing.
The prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 viral RNA in swabs from cats with unknown COVID-19 contact was low, while cats in COVID-19-affected households were more frequently positive for viral RNA and anti-SARS-CoV-2 antibodies (publication in progress). In November 2020, we detected the first RT-qPCR-positive Swiss cat. 6 The cat was living with the COVID-19-affected owner and showed moderate respiratory disease and apathy. It tested repeatedly viral RNA positive in nasal swabs and had antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 (receptor binding domain [RBD]) and neutralising activity (surrogate virus neutralisation assay). The serological assays were validated in collaboration with the University of Utrecht, the Netherlands. The cat’s specimen revealed a close genetic relationship with a human-derived virus from the same municipality. Contamination of the environment and the cat’s fur with viral RNA was demonstrated. These results are important to create awareness that SARS-CoV-2-infected people should observe hygiene measures to avoid infection of animal cohabitants.
Since then, I have identified four further SARS-CoV-2-positive Swiss cats, which were reported to the OIE. 7 All cats lived in COVID-19-affected households and some of them showed respiratory signs. Additionally, one cat from Italy was serologically positive 6 months after positive RT-qPCR; this represents the longest duration of seropositivity in a naturally SARS-CoV-2-infected cat. 8 The cat suffered from a B-cell lymphoma, which indicates that comorbidities may play a role in feline SARS-CoV-2 infections.
In a large-scale serological investigation, convenience sera from cats and other species collected since February 2020 at the Clinical Laboratory at Vetsuisse Faculty, Zurich, are being analysed for anti-SARS-CoV-2 antibodies and neutralising activity. Further investigations into the susceptibility of cats with respect to newly emerged variants, immunity and the role of comorbidities as factors promoting SARS-CoV-2-related disease are part of my research perspectives. The role of cats in this pandemic and implications in a One Health context, as well as the potential health risks for cats posed by the infection, need to be monitored to add knowledge to the field and prevent potential welfare impairments for cat populations.
References
Yasmin Parr – ‘Measuring the humoral immune response in cats exposed to feline leukaemia virus’
Retroviruses belong to an important and diverse family of RNA viruses capable of inducing neoplastic disease in their hosts. Feline leukaemia virus (FeLV) is a gammaretrovirus that infects domestic and wild cats worldwide. Although the prevalence of FeLV has greatly decreased as a result of effective vaccination and the identification and segregation of infected cats, it remains high in at-risk groups such as sick cats and cats from multi-cat households.1,2
The outcome of FeLV exposure is complex, difficult to predict and dependent on multiple factors.3-6 Cats that become infected following FeLV exposure can develop abortive, regressive or progressive infection depending on the host immune response. Cats with regressive infection typically endure a short viraemia before viral replication is suppressed. Cats with progressive infection are continuously viraemic and have a poor prognosis, developing FeLV-associated diseases and usually having a limited lifespan. In the early stages of infection, however, it can be difficult to determine whether FeLV-infected cats will develop regressive or progressive infection. Consequently, cats are required to be re-tested weeks later to confirm sustained or declining viraemia. 1 The antibody response to FeLV infection is mainly directed against the surface unit (SU) glycoproteins, 5 although antibodies recognising all major structural proteins have been detected in sera of cats with regressive infection. 7 A time-efficient measurement of an appropriate, specific antibody response would allow clinicians to stratify FeLV-infected animals more rapidly. Serological testing has the potential to aid the identification of cats with regressive infection and provide a means of monitoring the immune response to infection.
In this study, humoral immune responses were examined in 180 samples collected from 123 domestic cats that had been naturally exposed to FeLV, using a novel ELISA to measure antibodies recognising the FeLV-A and FeLV-B SU glycoproteins in plasma samples. 8 Exposure outcomes were assigned based on FeLV test results (p27 capsid antigen in plasma, peripheral blood mononuclear cells [PBMCs] proviral DNA qPCR and PBMC virus isolation). 8 Samples from cats with progressive infection displayed statistically higher p27 capsid antigen concentrations in plasma and higher proviral loads in PBMCs compared with cats with regressive infection, consistent with efficient viral replication. The strength of the humoral immune response to the SU protein correlated with the outcome of exposure. Cats with regressive infection demonstrated higher antibody responses to the SU proteins compared with uninfected cats, discordant cats (testing positive for some viral parameters but negative for others) and cats with progressive infection. Samples from cats with regressive infection contained virus neutralising antibodies (VNA) and samples containing VNA demonstrated high antibody responses to both FeLV-A and FeLV-B SU proteins.
In summary, cats with regressive infection had higher anti-SU antibody responses, as well as lower p27 capsid antigen levels and lower PBMC proviral DNA loads, compared with cats with progressive infection, as shown in Figure 1.
Cats with regressive infection had higher SU antibody (Ab) responses, lower proviral loads and lower concentrations of p27 capsid antigen compared with cats with progressive infection. Created with BioRender.com
Overall, these results demonstrate that an ELISA measuring the humoral response to FeLV SU complements the use of viral diagnostic tests towards defining the outcome of exposure to FeLV. Together, these tests could allow the rapid identification of regressively infected cats that are unlikely to develop FeLV-related disease and provide prognostic information to inform practitioners about the viral burden and the immune status of an infected cat. The FeLV SU ELISA described here has also been used to demonstrate active immune control in a subset of cats with low levels of p27 capsid antigen that were assumed to have regressive infection, 9 as well as to investigate correlates of protection following FeLV vaccination. 10