Indications for canine fecal microbiota transplantation

Abstract

Fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) is a novel method to treat intestinal and extraintestinal diseases by transplanting the microbiota in the feces of healthy animals into the gastrointestinal tracts of patients and reconstructing intestinal flora in the patients' intestine. In this article, we reviewed the recent studies of canine FMT focusing on its indications. FMT was proved effective to treat canine Clostridioides difficile infection (CDI), inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), canine parvovirus (CPV) diarrhea and acute diarrhea; upregulate the intestinal microbiota in dogs with acute hemorrhagic diarrhea syndrome (AHDS); and may have benefit for preventing canine post-weaning diarrhea. However, the specific FMT protecting gut mechanism and the role of long-term colonized microbiota in dogs still need numerous basic researches to reveal in future.