Upper respiratory disease may be underrecognized in hedgehogs: full analysis

Upper respiratory disease may be more common in hedgehogs’ noses than vets assumed

A new study in Veterinary Pathology is pushing European hedgehog respiratory disease beyond the usual focus on the lungs. Based on the journal abstract provided, investigators necropsied 50 rehabilitating hedgehogs that died after showing respiratory signs and found that 56% had upper respiratory tract disease. That’s notable because upper airway investigations in these cases have historically been limited, even though respiratory disease is a well-recognized cause of illness and death in hedgehogs entering rehabilitation. (ewda.org)

The study, by Yannick Van de Weyer, Steve Bexton, and Joanna Mihr, builds on a broader line of hedgehog respiratory research linked to the University of Liverpool and RSPCA rehabilitation centers. A 2025 project update from the European Wildlife Disease Association described a final hedgehog study cohort of 55 animals undergoing comprehensive pathological and microbiological investigation of the cardiorespiratory tract. In that update, upper and lower respiratory tract disease were described as almost equally represented, at roughly 45% to 55% prevalence in the targeted population. (ewda.org)

That background matters because the lower airway has already received more attention in the literature. A 2023 Veterinary Pathology paper on verminous pneumonia described lungworm-associated pneumonia as a frequent infectious disease in hedgehogs submitted for postmortem examination. Separately, a 2026 parasitology paper involving several of the same institutional partners reported high rates of respiratory nematodes in rehabilitating hedgehogs, underscoring how easy it is for clinicians to center lungworm and lower respiratory disease in their differential list. (livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk)

What seems different here is the emphasis on the upper airway. In the EWDA update, upper respiratory tract disease often manifested as severe rhinitis with gram-negative bacterial colonies, with trauma, dental disease, or foreign bodies flagged as possible contributors. The same update noted that verminous pneumonia and tracheitis were the most common lower respiratory findings, and that some respiratory disease could be linked to systemic salmonellosis. Taken together, that suggests many hedgehogs with respiratory signs may have multifactorial disease rather than a single, straightforward pulmonary process. (ewda.org)

I didn’t find a separate institutional press release or outside comment specifically on this newly published paper. But the wider rehabilitation literature supports the clinical relevance. Reviews and retrospective studies from Portugal, Italy, and Switzerland have consistently identified respiratory disease among the common reasons hedgehogs are admitted, die, or are euthanized in care. RSPCA rehabilitation guidance for veterinary teams also points to lungworm as a common cause of cough in underweight hedgehogs, illustrating the current clinical baseline that this new paper may now complicate. (pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov)

Why it matters: For veterinary professionals, the practical takeaway is to broaden the workup when a hedgehog arrives with respiratory signs. This paper suggests the nasal cavity and other upper airway structures may be involved more often than expected, particularly in animals from rehabilitation settings that may also have trauma, poor body condition, oral disease, parasite burdens, or secondary bacterial infection. That could influence decisions around sedation for oral and nasal examination, imaging, sample collection, antimicrobial stewardship, and expectations for recovery or release. The study is also a reminder that wildlife respiratory disease can reflect overlapping pathology, not just one dominant diagnosis. (ewda.org)

There’s also a systems angle. Britain and the Channel Islands have a large, fragmented hedgehog rehabilitation community, and prior survey work suggests recordkeeping and diagnostic capacity vary widely across centers. If upper respiratory disease is being underrecognized, standardized triage pathways and referral thresholds could become more important, especially for centers without ready access to imaging, pathology, or microbiology. (pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov)

What to watch: The next step is whether the full paper’s histopathology and microbiology data translate into practical diagnostic algorithms, including when to suspect rhinitis over primary pneumonia, which organisms are most consistently recovered, and whether findings support changes in treatment or rehabilitation protocols. (ewda.org)