Epidemiological Investigation And Intestinal Flora Analysis Of Feline Urolithiasis In Changchun

Feline urolithiasis is a urinary system disease with stones in the urinary tract,and it has symptoms such as frequent urination,hematuria,dysuria,frequent licking of the genitals,ectopic urination and vomiting.The incidence of this disease is increasing year by year,its etiology is complex,and it is easy to relapse.Feline urolithiasis is related to the body’s metabolism,but the pathogenesis of this disease is currently unclear,and there is a lack of effective preventive measures.The gut microbiota is involved in metabolic processes and is closely related to the occurrence of many metabolic diseases.Medical studies have shown that the gut microbiota can be used as a potential biomarker for the diagnosis of certain diseases,and can predict the occurrence of kidney stones based on clinical indicators and gut microbiota characteristics.Therefore,it is speculated that feline urolithiasis may also be associated with the gut microbiota.In order to further understand the disease and explore the relationship between feline urolithiasis and intestinal flora,this study conducted an epidemiological investigation on feline urolithiasis in Changchun,collected feline feces,and analyzed the structure and composition of the intestinal flora of felines with urolithiasis.In terms of epidemiological investigation,this study conducted statistics on the reception of felines in 10 comprehensive animal hospitals in Changchun from July2020 to June 2021.The basic information of feline with urolithiasis was collected,and the number of felines with urolithiasis was statistically analyzed by Graphpad Prism statistical software from the aspects of age,gender,breed,weight,whether they were sterilized and the time of onset.The results showed that the incidence of feline urinary tract disease within the scope of the investigation in the region was 15.44%（407/2636）,the incidence of feline urolithiasis was 4.82%（127/2636）,the proportion of feline urolithiasis in urinary tract diseases was 31.2%（127/407）,and the proportion of feline bladder stones in urolithiasis was 72.44%（92/127）.Among the 127 feline urolithiasis cases collected in Changchun : the incidence of the disease was lowest from June to August;The proportion of affected cats with a dry food-based diet is higher than that of affected cats with a wet food-based diet;the proportion of male felines was higher than that of female’s,with a male-female ratio of 1.89:1;the affected felines involved a total of 10 breeds,of which the British short-haired feline and the American short-haired feline accounted for the largest proportion,reaching35.43%（45/ 127）and 25.20%（32/127）;the age’s distribution of feline urolithiasis was 5 months to 8 years and 4 months old,centralized on the age from 1 to 5 years old;the average age of felines with urolithiasis was 3.306±0.246 years old in male,and 3.987±0.480 years old in female;the average weight of felines with urolithiasis in males was 4.496±0.126 Kg,and the average weight of felines with urolithiasis in females was 3.865±0.153 Kg.In terms of the analysis of the intestinal flora of felines with urolithiasis,this experiment was carried out by analyzing the microbial composition structure in fecal samples.Through the epidemiological investigation,fresh fecal samples of felines were collected by excluding metabolic,intestinal diseases and the use of antibiotics from Changchun,15 healthy feline fecal samples were selected,which were designated as healthy group（group A）,15 feline fecal samples diagnosed with feline urolithiasis were selected as stone group（group B）.Intestinal flora comparison analysis was performed on the 30 fecal samples by 16 S r RNA high-throughput sequencing.The results showed that there were differences in the intestinal flora of felines with urolithiasis and healthy felines in Changchun.The abundance of flora in the stone group was greater than that in the healthy group;the Alpha diversity（sample complexity analysis）and Beta diversity（multi-sample comparative analysis）of the intestinal flora of healthy and calculi-affected felines were not significantly different,but the analysis of the differences between the groups showed that the community structure differences between the two groups were significantly different;at the phylum level,the proportion of Proteobacteria was significantly increased in calculi-affected felines,and the proportion of Chlamydiae was significantly decreased in calculi-affected felines;at the genus level,compared with the healthy group,the abundance of Enterococcus 、 Ruminococcus＿gnavus＿group 、 Subdoligranulum 、Paraprevotella in the stone group was significantly increased,meanwhile,the abundance of Megasphaera 、 Holdemanella 、 Alloprevotella 、 Allisonella and Candidatus＿Amphibiichlamydia was significantly decreased.In summary,through epidemiological investigation,this study found that the incidence of feline urolithiasis is high in Changchun,and the distribution of the collected cases in terms of sex,breed,sterilization,age,season,weight,etc.showed a certain regularity;it can be seen that there are differences in the intestinal flora of felines with urolithiasis and healthy felines in this area by sequencing the bacterial flora of feline fecal samples.This study has laid the foundation for exploring new diagnostic and prevention methods for this disease from the perspective of intestinal microbiota,but the role of intestinal microbiota in the occurrence of urolithiasis needs to be further studied in the future.