Survey of intestinal helminth parasites of puppies in Ile-Ife, Nigeria

Abstract

A survey of gastrointestinal helminth parasites was conducted in a sample of fifty puppies aged 0-6 months from Ile-Ife, Nigeria between January 2004 and September 2005 using postmortem technique. Forty-two (84%) of the dogs were infected. No infection was detected in dogs aged 0-2 weeks while all the older puppies were infected. Four helminth species, Toxocara canis, Ancylostoma caninum, Dipylidium caninum and Spirocerca lupi were recovered with the prevalences of 80%, 70%, 12% and 2% respectively. Intensity of infection was measured directly by counting worms recovered after post-mortem. The mean±(SEM) worm burden for T. canis was 22.23 ± 4.33, A. caninum 10.85 ± 2.25, D. caninum 15.57 ± 2.26 and S. lupi 1.0. Monospecific infections were found in 20% of the infected dogs, whereas mixed infections with 2 or more species were found in 70% of the infected dogs. Most frequently encountered mixed infections (52.5%) were those involving the species T. canis and A. caninum. Female dogs consistently had larger average worm burdens than males.

Keywords: Gastrointestinal helminth, dog, Toxocara canis, Ancylostoma caninum, Dipylidum caninum, Spirocerca lupi.