wasting

wasting /wast·ing/ gradual loss or decay, with emaciation.

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wast·ing (wstng)

adj.

1. Gradually deteriorating; declining.

2. Sapping the strength or substance of the body, as a disease; emaciating.

n.

Emaciation.

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wasting,

n a process of deterioration marked by weight loss and decreased physical vigor, appetite, and mental activity.

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wasting

used in a general sense to indicate serious loss of body weight, or locally to indicate atrophy.

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wasting acetonemia

see acetonemia.

chronic wasting disease (CWD)

a transmissible spongiform encephalopathy affecting both farmed and wild elk and deer in certain states of North America. There is concern that it is currently spreading to infect wild cervid populations in states not previously infected. There is no evidence that it can transmit to humans.

postweaning multisystem wasting syndrome (PMWS)

was first described in 1991 in Western Canada and has since become widespread in North America and Europe. Produces slow progressive wasting in postweaned pigs with usually a low attack rate but high case fatality. Clinical signs and postmortem findings vary with some pigs jaundiced, some with diarrhea, but most with grossly enlarged inguinal lymph nodes. Respiratory signs are often associated with underlying interstitial pneumonia and pulmonary edema. The cause is uncertain, but caused at least in part by porcine circovirus 2 which is isolated from affected pigs usually in association with porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome (PRRS). Clinical disease is more common in high health herds, but pigs are often infected without showing clinical disease. Cases of porcine dermatitis and nephropathy syndrome (PDNS) are often seen in herds affected with PMWS. See also porcine dermatitis and neuropathy syndrome.

wasting syndrome

used to describe terminal stages of feline immunodeficiency virus infection; similar to the cachexia associated with neoplasia.