Longitudinal Pathogenesis Study of Young Red Deer (Cervus elaphus) after Experimental Challenge with Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis (MAP)

Table 1

Gross lesion score (Weeks 12 and 50), histopathological lesion severity scores (LSSs) for mesenteric lymph node (MLN), enteric (ENT) and total, and description of acid fast organisms (AFO) in the lesions as none, paucibacillary (PB), or multibacillary (MB) for samples biopsied at weeks 4 and 12 and taken at week 50 necropsy of the offspring of two unrelated sires.

Sire	Tag	Week 4		Week 12			Week 50
		Sex	MLN LSS	Gross	MLN LSS	AFO	Gross	MLN LSS	ENT LSS	Total LSS	AFO
1	506	F	2	0	5	PB	0	2	0	2	None
1	511	F	0	0	4	PB	0	2	2	4	PB
1	513	M	0	2	7	MB	0	4	4	8	PB
1	508	F	0	2	7	MB	4	6	6	12	PB
1	507	M	0	2	7	MB	5	7	5	12	MB
2	514	M	0	2	7	PB	4	4	2	6	PB
2	504	F	0	1	7	PB	0	3	4	7	PB
2	509	M	0	0	5	PB	0	4	4	8	PB
2	502	M	0	2	7	PB	3	5	4	9	PB
2	501	M	0	0	7	MB	0	5	5	10	PB
2	500	F	0	0	5	MB	0	4	6	10	PB
2	512	M	0	0	5	MB	1	5	6	11	PB
2	510	M	2	2	7	MB	1	5	6	11	PB
2	517	F	0	0	5	MB	0	6	6	12	PB

Gross lesion scores: 0, no visible lesions (NVLs); 1, slightly enlarged jejunal lymph nodes (JJLNs) and/or ileocaecal lymph nodes (ICLNs); 2, moderately enlarged JJLN/ICLN; 3, very enlarged JJLN/ICLN; 4, enlargement plus a single caseogranulomatous JJLN or ICLN lesion; 5, multiple JJLN and ICLN lesions.
MLN and ENT LSSs of 1 and 2 were regarded as very mild nonspecific, 3 as suggestive of very mild paratuberculosis, 4 as mild, 5 as moderate, 6 as moderately severe and 7 as severe paratuberculosis. Lesions were also described as no AFO, paucibacillary (PB), or multibacillary (MB).