H. parasuis is the agent of Glasser's disease, a syndrome that affects pigs in all stages of production and is characterized by fibrinous polyserositis and polyarthritis (3). Haemophilus parasuis infection has been recently recognized as a major problem in swine production, mostly in Specific Pathogen Free (SPF) and high health status herds. Fifteen serotypes of H. parasuis have been described in the literature, but a high percentage of isolates are not typable, indicating the existence of a larger number of serotypes (2). It is known that H. parasuis serovar 5 is one of the most virulent and most frequently isolated in elinical cases of Glasser's disease (4). One of the major problems related with H. parasuis diagnosis is the difficult isolation ofthis organism, especially when affected animals are treated with antibiotics. Immunohistochemistry (IHQ) is one of the techniques that can be used to detect the presence of antigens from an organism when it cannot be isolated (1). It has been shown thatH. parasuis antigens can be detected even inside of phagosomes inside the cytoplasm of macrophages and neutrophils, where the organism is not viable anymore (1), In this study, the histopathological findings and its association with immunohistochemicallabeling in tissues of experimentally infected pigs with H. parasuis serovar 5 were evaluated.
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