[Use of the ECG in bovine cysticerosis]

In two calves with massive cysticercosis and one healthy control calf the method of electrocardiographic examination was applied to a preciser determination of the clinical finding. The examination was performed on the 75th day after the experimental infection. Singly recorded electrocardiographic findings provided no characteristic symptoms indicating an injury of the conductive system of the heart. However, in both infected calves a lowering of the pulse frequency was found and in one of them also a flattening and a change of the polarity of the T wave. Autopsy and histological examination of the heart of the infected calves performed 111 days and 250 days after the infection revealed an attacking of the cardiac muscle by cysticerci and dispersed chronic myocarditis. This finding and the investigated dynamics of pathological changes in the course of cysticercosis in other experimental animals indicate that at the time of the electrocardiographic examination cysticercoid myocarditis at a stage of rest was recorded.