The lameness of racing camels is a major health concern and a financial burden for many camel owners. This study was aimed to investigate different acute phase proteins, cytokines (CYTs), and neopterin (NPT) in the blood of racing lamed camels to highlight their role in disease diagnosis, pathogenesis and monitor treatment response. A 35 out of 315 racing camels exhibited clinical lameness. The mean serum levels of serum amyloid A (SAA) and CYTs (TNF-α, IL-1α, IL-1β, and IL-6) in lame dromedary camels with different detected causes (punctured foot and traumatic injury) were remarkably over than those detected in control healthy dromedary camels. It was found that lame dromedary camels had non-significant changes in serum levels of haptoglobin (HP) and NPT when compared with control healthy camels. A dramatic decline was detected in serum levels of SAA and CYTs of lame camels after 10 days of treatment whereas, the levels of HP and NPT remain at the same levels without any significant changes. The ROC curves were created for the tested biomarkers. The AUCs were calculated to evaluate each variable’s accuracy to differentiate diseased from healthy camels. Based on the ROC curves and AUCs, both the SAA and CYTs provide similar and highly accurate diagnostic accuracy (AUC > 0.8) and monitoring of lameness treatment response.
Key words: Camel, cytokines, haptoglobin, lameness, neopterin, serum amyloid A
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