Ej tillgänglig fram till 29 juli 2015.

The large number of surrendered and feral Cats is a big animal welfare problem all over the world. Populations of feral Cats arise through a large number of unwanted Cats which can lead to surrender of these, through Cats allowed to roam free outside which can lead to the owner losing these and through the reproduction that occurs amongst these surrendered or lost Cats. One aim of this study is to give an account of this problem. It is however difficult to draw general conclusions about these populations of Cats since studies all over the world has been carried out on different types of populations, during different conditions and different periods of time. The welfare of many of these Cats is presumably low because they are exposed to risks as disease, starvation, climate, traffic, other animals and humans.

Salmonella in Cats has been documented for many years. Infection with S. Typhimurium,which is often referred to as Songbird fever, is believed to be caused by birds whoinadvertently infect Cats. The disease is often seen during the springtime when songbirdsreturn from their winter habitats, while other birds who have stayed during the winter are intheir weakest condition of health. In the spring of 1999 an epidemic of S.

The objective was to examine the frequency of unwanted behaviors in the Swedish feline population and what factors in the environment, inheritance and past life that have an influence on the frequency. SLU?s web poll generator was used to create a web poll which insinuated that it was a poll with objective to make an inventory of the Swedish feline population. I wanted to avoid that only owners to Cats with unwanted behaviors answered the poll. The web link to the poll was sent to SLUs students and posted on Internet forums for people interested in Cats.

The aim of this study was to see if an increased amount of gas could be seen in the small bowel of Cats subjected to trauma and if measuring the amount of gas could be of any use in the clinical evaluation of the patient. When the peristaltic waves in the small bowel decreases due to neurological damage or chock the microorganisms of the gut grow in number and possibly produce more gas and toxins. When the cat is stressed it can swallow more air then usual, and the air that is in solution with the chyme in the lumen of the gut separates from the ingesta. When the bowel isn?t moving it becomes easier for bacteria and toxins to penetrate the wall of the gut, and then get access to the bloodstream.

Particular to the cat among our pets is its´ unique nutritional needs and metabolism. The cat cannot produce some nutrients by themselves and must get them through their diet. This means that the cat quickly can suffer from various diseases unless the nutritional needs are covered. In those cases where man is completely in control of the cat?s diet, the right knowledge is crucial for the cat?s wellbeing.

Diabetes mellitus is characterised by persistent hyperglycemia in all species. Fructosamine is a glycated protein reflecting blood glucose concentration during the preceding weeks. It has become a valuable analysis to differentiate persistent hyperglycemia from transient stress induced hyperglycemia in Cats. It is also used to evaluate current therapy in diabetic patients. Although fructosamine is a well accepted analysis, it is sometimes regarded with scepticism.

Feline odontoclastic resorptive lesion (FORL) is a tooth disease affecting both domestic and wild Cats. Although FORL was described as early as the 1920´s, the etiology is still unclear. Several hypotheses have been presented but different studies have obtained contradictory results, and today there is no generally accepted etiology. Teeth affected by FORL are characterized by root resorption with progressive destruction of the tooth structure and alveolar bone as a consequence of clast cell activity. The disease is considered very painful when reaching a certain stage.

The Pallas cat is a small cat living in central Asia. The cat is approximately the size of a domestic cat but the Pallas cat is more stocky build and has a much thicker fur that enables the cat to live in a climate with temperatures plummeting to -50°C. The thick fur is one of the reasons this cat has been a popular game for hunters in the past. Nowadays there are other threats to the Pallas cat. One of the major threats today is the reduction of food sources.

Lower urinary tract diseases are a common problem in Cats all over the world. The symptoms are for example dysuria, pollakuria, stranguria, periuria and hematuria. In approximately two thirds of these Cats the underlying cause is not known and the disease is therefore called feline idiopathic cystitis (FIC). We need to know more about the disease to get a consistently effective treatment and prevention. A retrospective study was performed in 50 Cats with symptoms of FIC and where other causes of inflammation were ruled out. Data like breed, age, sex, body weight, feeding, therapy and therapeutic results were collected, also if it was an indoor or outdoor cat, duration of the symptoms, if there was any stress and if the cat was living with another cat.

Obesity is a growing global health problem among both humans and Cats with the risk of several medical conditions as a result. This can be detected and prevented by body condition assessment methods in order to visualize and detect possible or potential weight problems in Cats.To achieve the best results, owner and cat should be introduced to this as soon as possible in their contact with veterinary care.Purina Body Condition System and Walthams Feline Body Mass Index are both morphometric assessment methods that are quick, relatively cheap and simple to perform. 20 Cats with owners and a veterinary nurse student participated in a study to compare pet owners and a veterinary nurse student's assessment of the Purina Body Condition System and WALTHAM's Feline Body Mass Index. The body condition assessment methods were compared with each other, and it was investigated which method was preferred, the body condition distribution among the studied Cats and if long-haired Cats' body condition was more often misjudged. Results of the study showed a significant difference between pet owners and the veterinary nurse student's assessment of Purina BCS with a difference in median of 1.

The relationship between the pet and it's owner is a very important and interesting issue. Unfortunately there is not so much research on this and in addition to that Swedish veterinarian education does not put much emphasis on pet's role in society or their pattern of behaviour nor treatment. This thesis is based on an opinion poll that 20 dog owners and 20 cat owners contributed. The main purpose of the thesis was to compare the relationships that the pet (dog or cat) and its owner can have. The issues such as the pet owner's attitude to his/her pet, how the pet owner percieves and interprets the signals from the animal, and what they think about the natural behaviours and needs that their pets (might) have. The results show that dog- and cat owners are people who generally love animals, that they used to have even other animal species in the past, but when it comes to choice between a new dog or a new cat they choose the one that they previously have had and that they are used to. Most of a dog owners choose the dog to be their pet because of the company while the majority of a cat owners choose cat because Cats are independent and they are used to Cats.

Pheromones are chemical substances representing very specific signal messages within a species. Although a lot remains unknown about their precise effects, it is known that pheromones influence the behaviour of the receiver. Since the mid 1990s, when it was first possible to synthesise analogues of two fractions of feline facial pheromone, F3 (Feliway®) and F4 (Felifriend®), these have been used in so called pheromonotherapy to treat behavioural problems in Cats. The initial use of pheromones for specific behavioural problems has been extended to cover the wide field of stress related issues. This studycontains a questionnaire where veterinary nurses and surgeons at 50 Swedish veterinary hospitals and clinics were asked about their use of synthetic analogues to feline facial pheromones in the care and treatment of Cats.

Background: Vaccination is an important part in Cats? welfare. It both helps to prevent the individual cat from catching a disease or lessen the symptoms of it, and protects the entire cat population from an epidemic. It is the cat owner who makes the decision to vaccinate or not. Understanding the cat owners? perspective regarding vaccination may improve communication between the owner and the veterinary nurse, which may lead to a higher vaccination rate among Cats.

The analysis of acute phase protein serum amyloid A (SAA) has recently been brought into clinical use in veterinary medicine. Some of the difficulties with incorporating the SAA method in clinical practice have been the expensive and rather large equipment required for the method. Due to these difficulties only larger clinics can afford to use the SAA analysis.The company Equinostic has recently developed a smaller instrument that costs one-tenth of a larger instrument. The instrument is named EVA1 and has so far only been used to analyze SAA in horses.The aim of this study was to investigate if the EVA1 instrument could be used to analyze SAA in Cats. This study included 24 serum samples from cat, which were first analyzed twice on the EVA1 instrument and then sent to the Strömsholm Referral Animal Hospital in Sweden where they reanalyzed the samples using a validated reference method.