An epidemiological assessment of clinical poultry cases recorded through the existing passive surveillance at Kishoreganj District Veterinary Hospital during February-March 2016 was performed. A total of 200 cases (87 layers, 80 broilers, 21 ducks, and 12 pigeons) were included in this evaluation. The present study attempted to demonstrate the usefulness of passive surveillance data in quantifying the relative burden of poultry cases and their distribution along with
drug prescription patterns. The cases were diagnosed based on clinical history, clinical signs, and observable post-mortem lesions by the registered veterinarian or intern veterinarian. The most prevalent diseases in chickens were infectious bursal disease (IBD) (31.7%; CI (confidence interval) 24.7-39.3%),
coccidiosis (22.8%; CI 16.6-29.8%),
Newcastle disease (ND) (21.6%; CI 15.5-28.5%), and coli-
enteritis (8.4%; CI 4.6-13.6%). The most prevalent disease in ducks was duck
plague (DP) (76.6%; CI 52.8-91.7%).
Newcastle disease was most prevalent (66.7%; CI 34.8-90.0%) in pigeons. Infectious bursal disease,
aspergillosis, and colibacillosis respectively were seen in a higher proportion of cases in broiler chickens than in layer chickens (58.7%, 12.5%, and 11.2% vs. 6.9%, 1.1%, and 3.4%; p ≤ 0.05). Contrarily, ND was seen in greater proportion of cases in layer chickens (32.1%) than in broiler chickens (10.0%) (p < 0.001). Infectious bursal disease, ND,
coccidiosis, and
aspergillosis were higher in older age broilers than in younger broilers (p ≤ 0.05).
Antibiotics were often used to treat the
poultry diseases such as
trimethoprim with sulpha drugs (41%),
ciprofloxacin (39%),
sulphadiazine (27.5%), and
erythromycin (26%). Through the present study, we can see how a passive surveillance system would be an effective tool for delineating disease distributions and common treatment regimens, thus helping to mitigate disease prevalence.