No treatment is the best treatment for diarrhea in young foals, study suggests
Friday, August 5, 2011 - 08:30
in Health & Medicine
As (human) mothers will be all too ready to confirm, many young animals develop diarrhea shortly after birth. Diarrhoea in young calves is known to be caused by incorrect feeding management or by bacteria or viruses but this does not seem to be the case with diarrhea in young foals. Instead, it has been proposed that foals ‘automatically’ develop diarrhea around the time their mothers’ estrous cycle restarts after giving birth. This theory has now been refuted. The new results show that the intestinal flora of foals undergoes a major switch within the first two weeks of life; the change seems to be directly responsible for diarrhea.