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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Vet. Sci.
Sec. One Health
Volume 11 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fvets.2024.1482268
This article is part of the Research Topic Climate-Smart Livestock Production: Strategies for Enhanced Sustainability and Resilience View all articles

Climate change impact on blood haemogram in the horse: a three-year preliminary study

Provisionally accepted
Ömer Deniz Ömer Deniz 1Francesca Aragona Francesca Aragona 2*Barbara Anne Murphy Barbara Anne Murphy 3Kenan Çağrı Tümer Kenan Çağrı Tümer 1Serkan Bozacı Serkan Bozacı 1Francesco Fazio Francesco Fazio 2
  • 1 Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Kastamonu University, Kastamonu, Kastamonu, Türkiye
  • 2 Department of Veterinary Sciences, University of Messina, Messina, Italy
  • 3 University College Dublin, Dublin, County Dublin, Ireland

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Introduction The global climatic changes pose a substantial threat to the well-being and productivity of both humans and animals. Methods This study examined the impact of climate changes during different seasons over a 3-year monitoring period (2021-23) on various blood parameters including, white blood cells (WBC), neutrophils, basophils, eosinophils, lymphocytes, and monocytes, haematocrit (HCT), haemoglobin (HGB), red blood cells (RBC), platelets (PLT), mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentration (MCHC), mean corpuscular volume (MCV), and mean corpuscular hemoglobin (MCH). The study focused on 25 Thoroughbred mares located in Kastamonu- Türkiye. Thermal and hygrometric parameters, including ambient temperature, relative humidity, and ventilation, were collected. Subsequently, Temperature-Humidity index (THI) was computed. Blood samples were collected on the first day of every month from January 2021 to December 2023 and used for a complete blood count analysis. Between 2021 and 2023, changes in environmental indicators were correlated to changes in haematological parameters. Results Two-way for repeated measures ANOVA revealed a significant seasonal fluctuation (<0.0001) in ambient temperature, relative humidity, and THI. There was a reduction in RBC (<0.01), and MCH (<0.01) every year, HGB (<0.0001) in summer 2021, 2022 and in summer and autumn 2023. HCT (<0.0001), MCV (<0.01), showed decreasing values in autumn 2022 and 2023. MCHC values showed increasing values in July and August 2021, 2022 and in June 2023. WBC levels increased throughout the spring periods of 2021 and 2022. In April 2021, there were elevated levels of lymphocytes and monocytes (<0.0001) respectively. Discussion These findings could be helpful to promote the monitoring of physiological status both for the assessment of welfare status and for diagnostic purposes for the evaluation of possible disease outbreaks due to climate change in veterinary medicine.

    Keywords: Horses, Climate changes, Haemogram, Seasonal variations, haematology

    Received: 18 Aug 2024; Accepted: 26 Nov 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Deniz, Aragona, Murphy, Tümer, Bozacı and Fazio. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Francesca Aragona, Department of Veterinary Sciences, University of Messina, Messina, Italy

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.