Volume: 51 Issue: 1
Year: 2020, Page: 91-93,
Received: March 21, 2019 Accepted: May 18, 2019 Published: Jan. 1, 2020
Carcasses of five white Malabari breed of goats from Athirapally, Kerala suspecting intentional poisoning were presented to the Department of Veterinary Pathology, College of Veterinary and Animal Sciences, Mannuthy for veterolegal post-mortem examination. External examination revealed bloated abdomen in all the carcasses. Characteristic bitter almond odour could be noticed upon opening the distended rumen. Cassava leaves could be observed inside the rumen, reticulum, omasum and abomasum. Hemorrhagic reticulitis with presence of leaf remnants, pulmonary congestion, multifocal petechial hemorrhages in brain, pale discolouration of both kidneys and catarrhal enteritis were the other lesions noticed. Rumen contents were sent to the Chemical Examiner to Government for toxicological examination and the result confirmed cyanide toxicity. Histopathological examination revealed necrosis of villi in intestine, tubular degeneration in kidneys, pulmonary emphysema and congestion, sinusoidal congestion and vacuolation of hepatocytes in liver. Based on the gross examination, histopathological observations and chemical examination results, the case was diagnosed as cyanide poisoning possibly due to excessive consumption of Cassava leaves.
Keywords:
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© 2020 Prasad et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Prasad, C., George, A. J., Divya, C., Devi, S.S. and Abraham, M. J. 2020. A veterolegal case of Cassava plant toxicity in Malabari goats. J. Vet. Anim. Sci. 51(1): 91-93