Description and Treatment
Treponema cuniculi causes crusty lesions on the skin of the nose, genitalia, perineum, ears, nose, eyelids, lips and vent and responds to weekly injections of procaine penicillin SC q7days. 'Take care that you read the label on the injection bottle carefully. If the concentration is given in International units, remember that 1 IU = 0.6 mcgm (Prescott and Baggot 1993) and calculate the dose accordingly. The incubation period is 10-16 weeks (DiGiacomo et al 1984 cited by Harcourt Brown 2002). Do not give penicillins even by the parenteral route to nursing does for fear of toxic responses in the kits.
Diagnosis
Diagnosis is usually by the rapid response to treatment (five days after the initial injection) but can be confirmed by:
- special silver staining techniques of dermal and epidermal samples,
- serology,
- a Wasserman-type,
- rapid plasma reagent card test, or
- dark field microscopy to observe spirochaetes in a urine sample or fresh skin scrape
References
- Harcourt Brown F (2002) Textbook of Rabbit Medicine pub Butterworth Heinemann Oxford ISBN 0 7506 4002
- Prescott and Baggot (1993)
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