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Brutus, a beagle mix, peers through his cage while in isolation as he is being treated for suspected circovirus Thursday, October 3, 2013 at Emergency Veterinary Hospital in Scio Township.

(Melanie Maxwell | The Ann Arbor News)

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Editor's note: this story was updated at 5:20 p.m. with a statement from a MSU authority and a veterinarian.

An Ann Arbor area veterinarian is cautioning dog owners this week after seeing increase in what could be circovirus cases at her clinic.

Dr. Lindsay Ruland of the Emergency Veterinary Hospital in Scio Township said hundreds of dogs have been arriving at her clinic for the past year with severe abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting and interstitial pneumonia.

Cases have continued to mount—and Ruland said she’s seeing more this fall than ever: about five to 10 animals come into her 24-hour clinic each week, sick with a mysterious virus. In the month of September, six of them died.

“We think it’s the same thing we saw last year—just more aggressive,” Ruland said. “During the summertime we didn’t see that many. It seemed to correlate with last year’s flu season.”

Ruland said she suspects that the sickness could be attributed to circovirus, which is more commonly found in pigs and birds. Canine circovirus was first reported in June 2012 and detected in a California dog this April.

Learn more about circovirus

Two cases of canine circovirus have been identified in Michigan as of Thursday afternoon, said Thomas Mullaney, acting director of the Diagnostic Center for Population and Animal Health at Michigan State University.

Dr. Nancy Frank, assistant state veterinarian with Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, said that state officials have been talking with private veterinarians about circovirus and several vets have said they've seen symptoms of it.

The state has also offered testing assistance through Michigan State University to veterinarians who see symptoms they can't identify. Two to three veterinarians across the state have submitted samples, Mullaney said.

Thursday at the Ann Arbor area clinic, one dog with the mystery virus sat in an isolation room, waiting wide-eyed and panting with an intravenous drip of fluids attached to his paw.

Emergency Veterinary Hospital veterinary assistant Craig Aldrich checks the vitals signs of Brutus, a dog who has been isolated from other animals during treatment due to suspected canine circovirus.

Brutus, a beagle mix from Tecumseh, came into the clinic the night before lethargic and with severe abdominal pain. An X-ray revealed that he also had pneumonia.

At first, Ruland said she suspected all of the dogs had hemorrhagic gastroenteritis—but each of the animals also had a respiratory sickness that wasn’t characteristic. Common signs of the mystery virus also include bloody diarrhea.

The Emergency Veterinary Hospital treats animals across the metro Detroit area—and Ruland said symptoms of the virus have surfaced in her patients from all areas.

In each case, there were no clear correlations between the dogs with the virus except that the dog had been exposed to a sick human within the past week.

Though Ruland has sent tissue samples this fall to the Michigan State University Diagnostic Center for Population and Animal Health for diagnosis, the results have not yet been received.

Circovirus was most recently spotted in Ohio last month, where veterinarians were struggling to identify fast-acting bouts of sickness that left four dogs dead.



However, only one of those dogs tested positive for circovirus, though all had the same symptoms.

At Ruland’s clinic, it’s not just the pet owners and their dogs that have reported the same symptoms.

Ruland and her staff have reportedly become sick after working with dogs with the virus—as have their families at home. Their symptoms include abdominal pain, signs of a common cold and pneumonia—which led Ruland to believe that it’s not just circovirus.

It could be an influenza virus, Ruland said, as they constantly mutate. For a virus to cross-contaminate both animals and humans is extremely odd, Ruland said.

The Michigan Department of Community Health is monitoring the situation, said spokeswoman Angela Minicuci. They’ve been consulted in the matter, but no confirmed human cases of circovirus have been reported to the health department, Minicuci said.

Frank, with MDARD, said she has not heard any reports, anecdotal or otherwise, of transmission of circovirus or any other virus between a human and a dog.

Emergency Veterinary Hospital vet assistant Craig Aldrich fills a foot bath with solution outside of an isolation room at the hospital on Thursday, October 3, 2013. The hospital is taking extra precautions to prevent the spread of suspected circovirus.

In order for the MDCH to get involved, Minicuci said positive test results would have to be received by the department from a lab or hospital office.

Dr. Morgan Peterman is a veterinarian at the Ann Arbor Animal Hospital on West Liberty Street in Ann Arbor. She said her clinic has not seen an increase in caseload with circovirus symptoms of vomiting and diarrhea, and has not seen reports of the same symptoms of both dogs and their owners.

Additionally, her office has not seen an increased mortality rate among animals that have both of those symptoms, Peterman said.

Ruland said it’s not just dogs that she’s seen in her clinic presenting symptoms of the virus. Several cats, rabbits and birds have been brought in with the same symptoms—including a swan that she treated last week.

“We can’t let these patients keep dying,” Ruland said, noting that she’s had dogs die within 12 to 24 hours of being in her clinic. “If you’re seeing vomiting, lethargy, abdominal pain— please call someone and get your pet evaluated.”

At the clinic, dogs that have presented with moderate symptoms are kept overnight to receive specialized intravenous fluids that maintain their blood pressure, as the virus dilates the blood vessels so organs don’t get the blood flow that they need, Ruland said. The animals also receive strong antibiotics and pain medication for their severe abdominal pain.

With more severe cases, Ruland said the dogs go into surgery to determine where their blood flow is being constricted. Commonly, Ruland said she’s found the animal’s lymph nodes so swollen they constrict the blood vessels so much that the intestines are rotated into a knot. In the most severe cases, the animal's liver or pancreas has been abscessed beyond the point of repair, Ruland said.

Because it's not known what is causing the illness, Ruland said she's advising people to take the same precautions that they would to prevent a respiratory illness: regular hand washing and minimizing close facial contact with pets.



Ruland also advised that people that work in hospitals or with sick patients to change their clothes before interacting with their pets.

Last year Ruland said she sounded the alarm to several state and federal agencies, but no action was taken as there were no tests completed.

“I wish someone had listened last year,” Ruland said.

Amy Biolchini is the K-12 education reporter for The Ann Arbor News. Reach her at amybiolchini@mlive.com or on Twitter.