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A reliable ante-mortem test for the detection of scrapie in all genotypes has not yet been developed and clinical diagnosis remains a useful tool for surveillance purposes. This paper describes the results of a three-year study in which clinical signs consistent with scrapie were recorded according to standardized criteria in 245 sheep from 21 outbreaks in Italy in order to identify helpful criteria for the diagnosis of the disease. Thirty-seven sheep were scrapie-positive at post-mortem rapid testing, 23 showed weight loss, 20 had proprioceptive deficits, 17 demonstrated ataxia and nibble reflex, and some sheep had a combination of signs. Six scrapie-positive sheep were asymptomatic. The clinical protocol was easy to handle and appears to be a useful tool for improving passive surveillance. The data suggested that positive clinical history, nibble, and nibble combined with proprioceptive positioning deficit have a quite high negative predictive value. The protocol will be proposed as a tool for field inspection in passive surveillance in Italy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We report electroencephalographic findings in an anesthetized 4-month-old female drug-naive tiger (Tiger felis) affected by partial seizures with secondary generalization. Both clinical signs and electroencephalographic abnormalities were consistent with a forebrain lesion. Recurring epileptiform activity was noted in the left frontal, central and temporal derivations upon visual inspection of the electroencephalogram (EEG). A quantified EEG, displayed on brain maps, showed the predominance of delta and theta slow rhythms. As regards the absolute power, a prevalence of left frontal-temporal activity was noted. An infectious or inflammatory condition was thought to be the most probable cause of the symptomatic epilepsy in our patient. Unfortunately, other differential diagnoses could not be ruled out.