[Changes in the iron content, erythrocytes and hemoglobin in the blood of poultry with acute experimental fowl typhoid].

Abstract

The dynamic was followed up of the concentration of iron in the blood serum and the liver, of the erythrocyte count, of the haematocrit value of blood, and of the haemoglobin level in chickens of the New Hampshire breed at the age of 300 days, with experimentally induced acute typhoid. It was found that blood serum iron dropped abruptly as early as the second day of infection, whereas the level of iron in the liver rose. The erythrocyte count dropped almost twice as early as the second day following infection, the haematocrit value of the blood following the fluctuations of the erythrocyte count. The haemoglobin level dropped considerably on the third day, with gradually lowering values up to the seventh day. All changes that were recorded with these indices of the blood were found to precede the onset of the first clinical signs of the disease. The values of the haematologic indices with birds that survived came back to normal after the fourteenth day of infection. In the author's personal view leading in the pathogenesis of acute typhoid with the New Hampshire chickens was the lowered amount of serum iron, which disturbed the synthesis of haemoglobin and hence the maturity of erythrocytes, substantiating their lower count. The trophism of vitally important organs and tissues was also found to be disturbed.