College of Veterinary Medicine
Tim Boosinger, Dean334-844-4546
www.vetmed.auburn.edu
Veterinary Professors Focusing on Feline Heartworm Disease
A landmark study by two AU veterinary professors has shed new light into heartworm disease in cats. College of Veterinary Medicine professors Byron Blagburn and Ray Dillon confirm fundamental differences in the way heartworms affect cats and dogs, and they found that heartworms do not need to reach maturity to cause pathology in cats. Heartworm infection takes place when a mosquito carrying infective microscopic-size heartworm larvae, bites a cat or dog.
The study, recently presented at the 2007 American College of Veterinary Internal Med-icine Forum and published in the journal Veterinary Medicine, will answer many questions in the veterinary profession about the disease. It shows that feline heartworm is more dangerous to cats than previously thought, and it underscores the importance of prevention. The affliction, unlike its canine counterpart, for years was thought to be infrequent in occurrence and relatively benign in effect.
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FELINE FOCUS-Research done by CVM professors Byron Blagburn, left, and Ray Dillon is shedding new light into heartworm disease in cats. |
Boosinger, Hendrix Named to National Veterinary Posts
College of Veterinary Medicine Dean Timothy Boosinger has been elected president of the Association of American Veterinary Medical Colleges. He joined the Auburn University faculty in 1983 and has served as veterinary dean since 1995. Charles Hendrix, professor in the CVM Department of Pathobiology, was elected to a second term as vice president of the American Veterinary Medical Association. For the past year, Hendrix has been the AVMA's liaison to the Student AVMA and student chapters of the AVMA.