Animal Welfare Professionals

Hello!

Does anyone know of any evidence-based sources or recommendations for screening for FeLV and FIV in cats from hoarding cases? For example, we may intake over 100 cats in a short period of time, and we are trying to identify how many cats we should be testing for FeLV and FIV, to get a representative sample of the population. This avoids having to test every cat (to minimize costs) and hopefully gives a relatively accurate estimation of whether the cats have FeLV or FIV.

Thanks!

Lindsay

#hoarding
#Medicine,SurgeryandSterilization
#feline
#sheltermedicine

Could you start by just testing a few that look suspect? If those start coming back negative, you may be clear. If not, you will probably have to test more of them to get an accurate idea, if not all, depending on how many popped positive.

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Karen Jealous
PDX Cat Trapper
Portland OR
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I do know that there has been research done that showed that the hoarding cases (involved in the study) had an 8% rate of both FIV & FeLV in the hoarding cats versus the average rate of 2.5-5% and 2-3%respectively in the general population. It's higher, but not massively higher.  Rates are also generally  higher in sicker cats than healthy ones, so this tracks as hoarding cats are also usually much sicker with often multiple infections. Things like calicivirus, URI, giardia, coronavirus are much more prevalent in hoarding cats at rates as high as 56% (for giardia) and calicivirus at 80%.

We don't take the large hoarding cases at our rescue, but we tend to focus FIV/FeLV testing on cats showing signs of things like: bite wounds, dental issues, skin infections, persistent or recurring fevers, and urinary/bladder problems, especially if it involves older, unneutered males. Sometimes also animals with initially "mysterious" underlying health conditions.

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Michelle Flowers
Foster Program Manager
Seattle Area Feline Rescue
UW-AAB
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We actually deal with a lot of hoarding cases and will test those that are in rough shape like bite wounds, losing hair, etc. We typically don't test everyone unless the tests start showing up positive or we know there were cats with positive results in the area.

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Stefanie Schmidt
Animal Welfare Specialist
Hearts Alive Village
NV
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