Abstract
Summary
A disease characterized by spontaneous hemorrhage and death occurred in newly established breeding colonies of cesarean-derived, specific-pathogen-free, Sprague-Dawley rats and CF no. 1 mice. Male mice and rats were more commonly affected than females, and pregnant females were more commonly affected than nonpregnant females. In addition to a wide variety of hemorrhages, there was a high frequency of myocardial lesions in the decedent male mice. The clotting mechanism was studied and the defect was shown to be related to factors II and VII and possibly factor X. Menadione was effective in treating the disease but did not completely prevent it. The possible predisposing and etiologic factors, including the alteration of intestinal bacterial flora, are discussed, and the need to fully characterize animals used in experiments is stressed.
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