Title : Overview of animal leptospirosis and diagnostics

Leptospirosis is a bacterial, zoonotic, and much neglected disease that causes significant morbidity and mortality in domestic animals. The causative agents, pathogenic species of the genus Leptospira, are excreted via urine or found in the genital tract of domestic livestock and can survive in suitable moist environmental conditions to facilitate additional disease transmission. To date, 41 pathogenic species of Leptospira have been described comprising hundreds of serovars. Human leptospirosis is estimated to cause 1.03 million cases and 58,900 deaths each year. Animal leptospirosis leptospirosis can result in abortion, stillbirth, neonatal death, placentitis, and uveitis. Diagnostic procedures for leptospirosis fall into two groups: (1) antibody detection and (2) direct demonstration of the presence of leptospires. The microscopic agglutination test (MAT) is the antibody diagnostic assay of choice. A rising antibody titer in paired acute and convalescent sera concurrent with clinical signs of acute disease is diagnostic. Culture is definitive and provides an isolate that can be comprehensively characterized by genome sequencing and serotyping. The aim of this presentation is Advances in the Processing of Clinical Samples for Culture and Molecular Diagnosis of Animal Leptospirosis

Dr. Hamond is an Assistant Research Professor in the Wunder laboratory. She is also a Collaborating Researcher in the Bacterial Zoonoses Laboratory, Oswaldo Cruz Institute, Fiocruz, Brazil. During the past seventeen years, her studies and professional experience have focused on animal leptospirosis, working on its clinical aspects, and with high dedication to performing research in the laboratory and she established several key diagnostic assays in her career. While working on her PhD, she had the opportunity to perform an internship at the Biology of Spirochetes Unit at the Institute Pasteur (Paris, France), and work as a postdoctoral researcher at Federal Fluminense University (Brazil), Yale University (United States), National Institute of Agricultural Research and Institute Pasteur (Uruguay), and the National Veterinary Services Laboratories (NVSL), USDA (United States). Dr. Hamond’s research projects are aimed at identifying reservoirs and determine the etiology of Leptospira by culture and molecular approaches. Her work improves the scientific understanding about the etiology and epidemiology of leptospirosis, while providing local Leptospira isolates to increase the efficacy of serodiagnosis, vaccine formulation, and pathogenesis studies of leptospirosis. Dr. Hamond’s has published more than 60 peer-reviewed research articles related to microbiology and molecular biology of leptospirosis. She received the 2019 Early Career Research award from the International Leptospirosis Society and in 2022 was named Honorary Diplomate of the American Veterinary One Health Society (AVOHS), and in 2024 elected Executive Member of International Society of Leptospirosis (ILS).