Protective effects of probiotics and prebiotics on Eimeria tenella-infected broiler chickens

The current work was carried out to explore protective properties of commercially available probiotic (lacto g®) and prebiotic (immunolin®) preparations on performance traits,lesion scores,shedding of oocysts and some immunological parameters in eimeria tenella infected broiler chickens. a total of 108 one-day-old broiler chicks were randomly divided into six groups: 1) probiotic non-challenged; 2) prebiotic non-challenged; 3) probiotic challenged; 4) prebiotic challenged; 5) non-treated challenged (positive control); 6) non-treated non-challenged (negative control). chicks were challenged with e. tenella oocysts (4×104) at 21 days of age. supplementation with probiotics or prebiotics did not significantly improve the body weight or feed conversion ratio of birds compared to control. no mortality was recorded in the 3rd group while a high mortality rate (20%) was detected in the 4th and 5th groups. lesion scores were significantly reduced in the 3rd group,while the 4th did not show any improvement in comparison with the infected group. the total number of oocysts starting from 7th up to 13th day post-challenge (pc) was significantly reduced in the 3rd and 4th groups in comparison with the control infected group. it could be concluded that there was a protecting effect of the probiotic and prebiotic preparations used,that helped to reduce the negative effects of coccidiosis but was not associated with an improved growth performance. © 2015 pvj.