Cow with parasite

Hi All,

I am new to this forum, and fairly new to the world of caring for farm animals. I currently have a two-year old cow Jersey-Angus mix who has persistent diarrhea despite consults from our livestock vet.  We've tried multiple treatments of Safeguard, Panazuril, and Doxycycline to get rid of it and it keeps coming back.  We rescued her and a steer earlier this year and believe one of them came with the parasite since there are no environmental factors that could be causing it.

Anyone else have experience with this and can recommend a treatment that has worked?  I am truly at a loss as how to help her to get over this, and our vet seems to have given up on us...Thanks in advance.

Did the vet do a fecal test and prescribed those meds? In other words, do you know for sure it’s parasites?

Have you look at this;
BVD (bovine viral diarrhea): Animals infected with BVD have scours, or constant diarrhea, nasal discharge and fever. This is a serious disease that can cause intestinal hemorrhaging, especially in young or weak animals.

I searched this ;
SAFE-GUARD features broad-spectrum activity against internal parasites, which threaten herd health, feed intake

Doxycycline.
Is a semi-synthetic tetracycline antibiotic, derived from oxytetracycline. It may be used orally (dogs, cats and horses) or intravenously (dogs and cats).

Ponazuril
While it is labeled for use in horses, it is also used in cats, dogs, rabbits, birds, and reptiles to treat protozoal parasites ‘off label’ or ‘extra label’. Many drugs are commonly prescribed for off label use in veterinary medicine. In these instances, follow your veterinarian’s directions and cautions very carefully as their directions may be significantly different from those on the label.
As a layman when it comes to cows, is the correct stuff being used?

Where diarrhoea is the most obvious sign, the primary causes can be thought of broadly in two different groups, nutritional and infectious.
Nutritional causes include:
acidosis (e.g. grain overload)
lush green feed
cobalt or selenium deficiency
copper deficiency or toxicity

Infectious causes include:
worms
viruses (e.g. bovine viral diarrhoea virus)
bacteria (e.g. Salmonella or Yersinia - see the Bacterial diarrhoea heading below)

It is important to remember that some infectious causes of diarrhoea, such as Salmonella and Yersinia, can potentially affect humans.
Always practise high levels of hygiene when dealing with sick cattle.

There are many other diseases where diarrhoea presents as a secondary issue. Some of these include:
liver disease
peritonitis (e.g. hardware disease)
heart failure
chemical or plant poisonings (e.g. lead or nitrate)

It is possible the issue is the environment - if it is a parasite (and most likely is) you need to understand the transmission route that can cause the animal to be continuously RE-infected.

Primarily parasites are transmitted via an infected insect bite that "injects" the parasite into another animals blood stream (fleas, mosquitoes, flies) OR fecal/ground contamination leading to oral ingestion - if the ground (indoor AND outdoor) is not sanitized, then re-infection will continue to occur. If flying/biting insects are not controlled transmission can occur over and over.

My apologies if you have already had a definitive identification of the parasite and I missed it: you need to identify the parasite(s) and ensure you are covering ALL reinfection routes to successfully end the parasite cycle.

As an example: many worms follow a 2-3 week cycle from "baby" (often unaffected by treatment) to adult (the most common infection cause) able to "lay eggs", thus continuing the lifecycle that leads from infection to treatment to reinfection.

I would also be on the lookout for secondary pneumonia as a cow weakened by parasites will commonly crop up with secondary infections.

Scrupulous cleaning, disinfection and manure handling may well be crucial in solving this issue. Ensure feed is never put at risk of fecal contamination (use feeders or other method) do not place on the ground. Also look at the possibility of water contamination...

Liv Smith wrote:Did the vet do a fecal test and prescribed those meds? In other words, do you know for sure it’s parasites?

I feel this is a very important question that maybe this was answered and I missed that.

There are lots of different kinds of parasites.

I feel knowing what kind of a parasite this cow has is important in determining how to treat it.

To me, everyone is assuming worms.

What if this cow has a water-borne parasite? Like Giardia.

Marium, please reply with what was done to determine what parasite your cow has.  What parasite does your cow have?