Pharmacological Therapy of 141 Client-Owned Cats with Feline Infectious Peritonitis with Mutian ® Xraphconn Adenosine Nucleoside Analogue and Prognostic Prediction of Their Clinical Outcomes

Background: Feline infectious peritonitis (FIP) is a fatal disease caused by feline coronavirus or its mutated pathogen designated as FIP virus. The most common form of FIP is wet or effusive, with non- regenerative anemia and clinical signs of mainly non-specific, such as recurrent fever, anorexia and weight loss. Recently, promising results using new anti-viral drug for treating cats with FIP were observed, but identification of rescuable FIP has been still challenging. It is highly worth to identify infected cats possible to be saved by such an anti-viral agent.Methods: At the initial veterinarian’s examination, owner inquiry-based signalments, viral gene detection by PCR and representative laboratory tests for diagnosis of FIP including hematocrit, A to G ratio, total bilirubin, serum amyloid-A and α1-acid globulin of 141 cats with effusive FIP were compared with those of 28 non-FIP disease cats. Consequently, 116 of them were rescued by administration of anti-viral drug Mutian X and the residual 25 were deceased unfortunately under treatments. Clinical and laboratory indicators observed prior to initial medication were also evaluated statistically between survived and non-survived groups.Results: Expectedly, levels for a few items of signalments (appetitive and activity scores), hematocrit, A to G ratio, total bilirubin, serum amyloid-A, α1-acid globulin and viral gene were found to be distributed distinctively between 141 FIP and 28 non-FIP cats. In the comparison between survived and non-survived FIP cats, most of their parameters including levels for hematocrit, A to G ratio, serum amyloid-A, α1-acid globulin and viral gene were not statistically different. Interestingly, total bilirubin concentrations of survived FIP cats were declined significantly than those of non-survived, and similarly, body temperatures, appetitive and activity scores appeared to be higher probably in accordance with their physical condition.Conclusions: Several clinical and laboratory indicators were informative in diagnosis of effusive FIP. We have investigated that one of the quantitative markers, total bilirubin levels, tend to be distributed characteristically in rescuable cats with effusive FIP. Elevated levels of total bilirubin may be a prognostic risk factor for severe FIP, predicting no clinical benefit obtained by using Mutian X as a therapeutic agent.