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Melanie Cole (Host): Welcome to UF Vet Med Voice with the University of Florida College of Veterinary Medicine. I'm Melanie Cole and joining me today is Dr. Rhoel Dinglasan. He's a professor of infectious disease at the University of Florida College of Veterinary Medicine. And he's here to highlight neglected diseases of companion animals. Dr. Dinglasan. I'm so glad to have you join us today. As we're talking about this notable gaps exist when it comes to knowledge and diagnoses of several diseases that affect companion animals, especially canines. Can you tell us what is meant by neglected diseases of companion animals? What are we talking about today?

Dr Rhoel Dinglassen: Well, thank you very much, Melanie, for this opportunity beyond this podcast. So yeah, so neglected diseases is a term that has transferred over from human medicine whereby. most people don't know it's a problem locally. It may be a problem elsewhere even outside of our country. And so when that is the frame of mind, even veterinarians don't know to look for it. So it becomes underdiagnosed. And then in some cases, completely undiagnosed. And framework of Companion Animal Health, especially dogs, canines, one of the things that, I wanted to talk to you today about are tickborne diseases, as a primary example for neglected diseases for companion animals.

Melanie Cole (Host): Well, then tell us a little bit about, you mentioned tickborne where have you identified these gaps in knowledge and disease diagnose?. Expand a little bit on that and mention any others you'd like to.

Dr Rhoel Dinglassen: So, let's take a, one health view on this. And the reason why this is important to do is because there are many diseases OSIS, so, diseases that affect both animals and humans, and many of these are vector born. So what does vector borne mean? So these are transmitted by arthropods. And in this scenario I had mentioned earlier tickborne diseases. So let's take it for example, the United States. As of 2017, it was estimated by United States centers for disease control that there's up to 59,000 cases of tickborne diseases.

And then more recently in, the 2019 survey that has only gone down to 50,000. Now, while everyone thinks about tick born diseases as primarily Lyme disease, which is true. A lot of the reported infections are lyme disease because everyone primed to look for it. Right. But there are many other tick borne diseases that are transmitted in the United States. And one of these diseases is called babesiosis. So in human babesiosis cases, there's reportedly only about just shy above 2000 cases in 2019.

So it's even in human disease, it's not only underappreciated in terms of human disease. It's also going underdiagnosed or undiagnosed altogether, as I mentioned, and undiagnosed altogether is especially important for children. Now, if we can't even do a good job on that for human disease, it's very much a neglected disease when it comes to veterinary health. Now veterinary health people say, well, I'm pretty sure the agricultural industry the importance of, bovine babesiosis, cattle fever, tick fever.

And that's true, but we're talking about companion animal health. So our, dogs in our homes, know, in the shelters and so forth. So, that is an issue here. when people don't know something exists in your own backyard, you don't look for it. It's true for human diseases. It's true for veterinary diseases.

Melanie Cole (Host): What a great point that is Dr. Dinglasan. So, how does current research aim to close those gaps? What's exciting or research that other providers may not know about? Tell us where you're going with this?

Dr Rhoel Dinglassen: Right. I hate to disappoint you, Melanie. The gap is so basic that we actually have to go down to brass tax, we have to go and determine what is the extent of the problem. So why is that not as, innovated or exciting it's because we actually have to acknowledge, there is a problem. There's a lack of data and the lack of data stems, because there's lack of interest. There's a lack of interest. There's a lack of funding and support for it. Right. And it's a vicious cycle. So where is the field right now? There are some Sentinel groups, some really, great scientists out in North Carolina have looked into this problem for canine babesiosis.

And I'll explain what babesiosis is in a bit. and they, rely on samples that are submitted to them, you know? And so this is a vector borne disease laboratory. And so they're limited in how, much information they can gather for specific regions. When you say the Southeastern United States, there's over 11 states, right? So when, you get this, aggregate of data, did people ask, is this my backyard we're talking about or Tennessee? Right. and so again, it tells people like, well, you know, maybe it's not really my problem. It's not something we should look for.

Okay. So now the challenge is can we do it at the state level? And the other challenge is where, and what groups of of dogs really most at risk? Who are the most vulnerable populations of dogs? If we can identify those, we start to understand better, what is the problem? And then from there we can determine new solutions.

Melanie Cole (Host): So then let's talk about that link. You started to touch on it a little bit, doctor between environmental exposures, as well as linkages between those exposures and chronic diseases like diabetes or lupus. There are definitely translational aspects to your work as well as impacts on humans and plants. Yes. So how do you envision this work, this scope of what we're talking about, translating to care for both animals and humans?

Dr Rhoel Dinglassen: Absolutely. That's a great question. So the answer, as you said earlier, diagnostics. Now the problem with diagnostics is where are you gonna do that diagnostic test? The example that I had mentioned earlier was a laboratory, right? So it's a laboratory that was built and designed to take samples from all over the US or, regionally and then they analyze it. That data then sits in that laboratory and doesn't really go back the veterinarians very quickly. And that's the biggest problem.

What veterinarians need is a point of care test, something that they can do in their clinic, something they can do in their office. Something that can be done in a shelter. And that's where this big gap lies. We don't have good rapid tests diseases such as Babesia. Interestingly enough, there are tests that are available elsewhere in Europe, and so forth where Babesia is also widespread. And tests are not in the United States for veterinary. Or it hasn't been approved for veterinary care.

So this is the problem, how can we define the scope of, infection with among our dog populations if we don't have a test that not only can capture infection prevalence, but also allows a veterinarian to already, have a trigger? So What the trigger is like, what is the care that would be needed for this. canine, and that's what's missing. So that's where we come in. let me just tell you a little bit about Babesia. So, babesiosis is a tickborne disease, primarily. It's caused by predone parasite and the genus of that parasite is Babesia.

And these parasites invade and attack the red cells, the blood cells in mammals, including humans and dogs. In North America, the Babesia parasites that have been reported to infect dogs include things like Babesis canis, Babesia Vigeli, Babesia Volties, Babesia Gibsia. Now these all sound like foreign names but these are just a different parasitic species are Babesia that infect our dogs. So here's an example some earlier studies done in Florida that they've actually described babesiosis is commonly found in greyhounds and pit bull terrior type dogs. It's very specific, right? Greyhounds and pit bull terrior type dogs.

For greyhounds, was discovered that transmission was occurring in the Greyhound kennels. It's very high infection prevalence there, than 50%. And if you only study pit bull stereotype dogs, it could be even higher than that. And also pit bull type dogs, as you also know, used for dog fighting. And this is where the story of babesiosis becomes really interest. So how does a dog catch, this parasite? Again by tick bite, which was shown primarily to be on the route of infection for greyhounds, it can also be transmitted when an infected dog bites another dog.

So this is where the pit bull stereotype dogs come in and pit bullsdon't just necessarily bite other pit bulls. They can also bite other dog species. Right? All depends on what the situation is. Now, interestingly enough, this parasite can also in infect pregnant females, then the parasite can be transmitted by the mom, to the offspring pubs. So this makes it a very complicated parasite to even understand transmission as a whole. Now this transmission that's observed from mom to pop has been only ascribed to pit bull Terriors with Babesia Gibsia eye infection in particular.

And so the story is deeper right than just which dogs are infected and where? So the last thing is you know, this is also important in human health. But we also have to have supply for dogs that undergo operations and, many clinics all across the United States, even university of Florida is no exception. They have canine blood donors, And what, will happen if your, blood is tainted with the parasite, then you infect another dog through the tainted blood transfusion. So what's the problem there? Well, babesia is not routinely scream. And these blood supplies. So this becomes a problem.

Melanie Cole (Host): This is fascinating. What you're talking about. And while you're telling us about potential treatment strategies that are adding to this promising approaches that are being developed and tested as you're discussing for this. Can you tell us a little bit, as we wrap up, why this interaction between veterinarian human medicine is so important with clinicians, researchers, agencies, governments, all working together, dr. Dinglasan for the benefit of domestic and wild animals and human health? And really, as we look at it, the global environment?

Dr Rhoel Dinglassen: If we recognize that we are all in it together, what affects us, affects everything, including those that we love. Those are pet family members. Then it becomes a no brainer that this is an important thing. And so it's not a good answer what I provided, but is an answer to that question. When we cannot do well for human health, we cannot potentially do well for our animal health. If we don't put effort in for diagnostics, by the way, the diagnostics that would apply for canine Babesiosis. If we can also do that for human medicine, it's a win-win, we don't even have that.

Among all of the parasitic diseases. I studied malaria as well. It's very well funded by the Gates foundation, but Babesia not so. And so it becomes this perception. So the perception is, oh, it's not really that bad a disease, it really doesn't affect, a lot of people, then we relegate it to, it's not as important. Great. And it becomes neglected. But the problem is we don't even know the size of the problem. So how can we even do that prioritization or deprioritization in this case? And so are important things to consider. Innovation will follow the need, When you have a very well articulated need, innovation will happen.

In many cases, we in public health, we say we have all these public health problems, but there's an engineering approach to this. And that's where we bring in our colleagues in engineering say help us solve the public health problems. And that is also with canine health problems. It's very costly the treatment for this disease, Babesiosis is extremely costly. And I mentioned a vulnerable population before we're talking about animal shelter dogs. the pit bulls, the other dogs that, something may have happened to the owner. Remember what happened in Katrina?

All these dogs were left to wander. And so you, have to say like, okay, these are vulnerable population to go into an animal shelter. Animal Shelters rely on the goodness of donations, but treatment for babesiosis, especially Babesi Gibsoni is over $200. and 10 days worth of treatment. So It becomes difficult for anyone to imagine that an animal shelter and you've heard here in Elatera county it's so full already, they can't even take in dogs anymore. the problem is magnified.

So how do we remove neglected tropical diseases? We first undertsna dits importance in the whole environment in where we live, this is not a foreign somewhere else worry. This is in our own backyard. And just a little story for you. I mentioned I work on malaria, right? So some people say, well, why are you working Babesia? So Babesia parasites and malaria parasites are actually very similar and they're quite related to each other. But that aside I'm a big rescue lover.

All my dogs have been rescues, and a large number of my dogs have been pit bulls. And I lost my dog to Babesia Gibsoni, and it's because when we rescued her from the shelter, there was no screen. We didn't know she was already infected. And it's a chronic infection. The only time we knew was when it was too late to even help her. So when Minnie was her name and she was passing away, I promised her I'll work on this. So here I am.

Melanie Cole (Host): What a lovely story doctor. And thank you so much for sharing that with us and sharing your passion and compassion for our companion animals, which are really members of our own family. And highlighting the importance of the need for research globally and within our own communities to help out with these diseases. So thank you again for joining us and for more information about the University of Florida College of Veterinary Medicine, and to listen to more podcasts from the experts at the University of Florida College of Veterinary Medicine, please visit vetmed.ufl.edu.

You can also check out vetmed.ufl.edu/ufachievers for more information on our topic today. That concludes today's episode of UF Vet Med Voice brought to you by the University of Florida College of Veterinary Medicine, advancing animal human and environmental health. I'm Melanie Cole.