Idiopathic inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is a common cause of chronic gastrointestinal (GI) disease in dogs and cats.Accumulating evidence in human IBD and experimental colitis in animal models suggests that the resident microbiota contribute tothe pathogenesis of chronic immunologically-mediated intestinal inflammation. Dogs with IBD have distinctly different duodenal microbial communities compared to healthy dogs. Additionally, canine histiocytic ulcerative colitis now is recognized to be associated with adherent and invasive E. coli (AIEC), and affected dogs frequently respond to fluoroquinolone antimicrobial therapy. Gastrointestinal signs in cats with IBD have been linked to altered microbial composition with subsets of intestinal bacteria and histopathologic inflammation. Thus, there appears to be a sound rationale for evaluating IBD treatment protocols that target enteric bacteria and the harmful immune responses that they might evoke.
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