Managerial and environmental determinants of clinical mastitis in Danish dairy herds

Satô, Kenji; Bartlett, Paul C.; Alban, Lis; Agger, Jens Frederik; Houe, Hans

doi:10.1186/1751-0147-50-4

Cited by 12 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 22 publications

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“…We used factor loadings of 0.40 as a lower limit for a clinical variable to load on a given factor. A similar limit has been recommended by Sharma (1996), while another study reported a lower limit (0.30; Sato et al, 2008) and yet another study reported a higher limit (0.50; Thoefner et al, 2001). Having used a higher limit of the factor loadings in this study would not have changed the interpretation of the factors, since the clinical signs, which were important in the interpretation, had loadings above 0.5.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 75%

The interrelationships between clinical signs and their effect on involuntary culling among pregnant sows in group-housing systems

Jensen

Bonde

Kongsted

et al. 2010

Animal

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Sows suffering from clinical signs of disease (e.g. lameness, wounds and shoulder ulcers) are often involuntarily culled, affecting the farmer's economy and the welfare of the animals. In order to investigate the interrelationships between clinical signs of individual pregnant group-housed sows, we performed an explanatory factor analysis to identify factors describing the patterns of variation of clinical signs. Moreover, we investigated how these emerging factors affected the probability of a sow to be either (i) euthanized, (ii) suddenly dead, (iii) sent to slaughter due to clinical signs of disease such as claw lesions or wounds or (iv) involuntarily culled (representing a pool of sows that were either euthanized, dead or sent to slaughter due to disease). Data from 2.989 pregnant sows in group-housing systems from 33 sow herds were included in the study. A thorough clinical examination was performed for each sow by using a protocol including 16 different clinical signs. Farmers recorded all cullings and deaths and the reasons for these actions in a 3-month period after the clinical examination. Among the observed sows, 4.2% were involuntarily culled during the 3-month period. From the explanatory factor analysis, we identified three factors describing the underlying structure of the 16 clinical variables. We interpreted the factors as 'pressure marks', 'wounds' and 'lameness' Logistic analyses were performed to investigate the effect of the three factors and the parity number of each sow on the four outcomes: (i) euthanized, (ii) suddenly dead, (iii) sent to slaughter due to clinical signs of disease and (iv) involuntarily culled. The analyses showed that 'lameness' significantly increased the risk of sows to be involuntarily culled (P 5 0.016) or sent to slaughter due to clinical signs of disease (P 5 0.026). Lameness is generally considered to be an important welfare problem in sows, which could explain the increased risk seen in this study. By contrast, 'pressure marks' and 'wounds' did not have any significant effect on the four outcomes (P . 0.05).

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 75%

The interrelationships between clinical signs and their effect on involuntary culling among pregnant sows in group-housing systems

Jensen

Bonde

Kongsted

et al. 2010

Animal

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“…The sum of these reports confirm that despite the use of sand in freestalls, the effect of housing and bedding on the incidence of intramammary infections and BTSCC is multifactorial and difficult to fully explain with survey studies without knowledge of application of management practices among farms. Several measures of attitudes and values were associated with BTSCC in this study, consistent with studies finding that attitudes of farm managers and owners about mastitis and milk quality may affect SCC, mastitis incidence, and use of antimicrobial agents (Bigras-Poulin et al, 1985;Barkema et al, 1999;Vaarst et al, 2002;Barnouin et al, 2004;Sato et al, 2008). In our study, respondents that scored higher on the mastitis problems attitude scale-belief that mastitis was a problem on their farm and that not following milking and treatment protocols was a problem-reported higher BTSCC.…”

supporting

confidence: 89%

“…Questions covered 7 categories: (1) sociodemographics and farm characteristics (age, education, race, Mennonite or Amish, native English speaking, herd size, and so on; Norman et al, 2011); (2) milking proficiency (pre-and postmilking teat disinfection, wearing gloves during milking, and so on; Erskine et al, 1987;Wenz et al, 2007); (3) milking systems (parlor type, maintenance patterns, and so on; Mein, 2012); (4) cow environment (housing, grouping, bedding, and so on; Dufour et al, 2011); (5) infected cow monitoring and treatment (record keeping, use of cultures, and so on; Wenz et al, 2007;Bhutto et al, 2011); (6) farm labor (number of workers, employee management strategies, and so on ;Fuhrmann, 2002;Brasier et al, 2006;Stup et al, 2006); and (7) attitudes toward mastitis and related antimicrobial agent use (farm goals, belief in causes of mastitis, sources of information about mastitis and antimicrobials, and so on, Vaarst et al, 2002;Wenz et al, 2007;Sato et al, 2008;Jansen et al, 2009).…”

Section: Survey Questionnairementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Research has also demonstrated the importance of farmer attitudes and values in determining mastitis rates and antimicrobial use (Vaarst et al, 2002;Sato et al, 2008). In a survey of 336 Dutch dairy farms (Jansen et al, 2009), farmers' attitudes toward mastitis (e.g., believing mastitis was due to bad luck) were significantly associated with increased BTSCC and incidence of clinical mastitis as much as self-reported control procedures (e.g., forestripping cows before milking, or checking the milking vacuum daily).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Herd management and social variables associated with bulk tank somatic cell count in dairy herds in the eastern United States

Schewe

Kayitsinga

Contreras

et al. 2015

Journal of Dairy Science

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The ability to reduce somatic cell counts (SCC) and improve milk quality depends on the effective and consistent application of established mastitis control practices. The US dairy industry continues to rely more on nonfamily labor to perform critical tasks to maintain milk quality. Thus, it is important to understand dairy producer attitudes and beliefs relative to management practices, as well as employee performance, to advance milk quality within the changing structure of the dairy industry. To assess the adoption rate of mastitis control practices in United States dairy herds, as well as assess social variables, including attitudes toward employees relative to mastitis control, a survey was sent to 1,700 dairy farms in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Florida in January and February of 2013. The survey included questions related to 7 major areas: sociodemographics and farm characteristics, milking proficiency, milking systems, cow environment, infected cow monitoring and treatment, farm labor, and attitudes toward mastitis and related antimicrobial use. The overall response rate was 41% (21% in Florida, 39% in Michigan, and 45% in Pennsylvania). Herd size ranged from 9 to 5,800 cows. Self-reported 3-mo geometric mean bulk tank SCC (BTSCC) for all states was 194,000 cells/mL. Multivariate analysis determined that proven mastitis control practices such as the use of internal teat sealants and blanket dry cow therapy, and not using water during udder preparation before milking, were associated with lower BTSCC. Additionally, farmer and manager beliefs and attitudes, including the perception of mastitis problems and the threshold of concern if BTSCC is above 300,000 cells/mL, were associated with BTSCC. Ensuring strict compliance with milking protocols, giving employees a financial or other penalty if BTSCC increased, and a perceived importance of reducing labor costs were negatively associated with BTSCC in farms with nonfamily employees. These findings highlight the need for a comprehensive approach to managing mastitis, one that includes the human dimensions of management to maintain the practice of scientifically validated mastitis control practices.

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“…In the Nordic countries, mastitis incidence rates per lactation vary between 0.2 and 0.4 (Heringstad et al, 2000). Sato et al (2008) reported a mean rate of 44.7 cases per 100 cow-years for CM in Danish dairy herds.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Bivariate threshold models for genetic evaluation of susceptibility to and ability to recover from mastitis in Danish Holstein cows

Welderufael

Janss

Koning

et al. 2017

Journal of Dairy Science

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Mastitis in dairy cows is an unavoidable problem and genetic variation in recovery from mastitis, in addition to susceptibility, is therefore of interest. Genetic parameters for susceptibility to and recovery from mastitis were estimated for Danish Holstein-Friesian cows using data from automatic milking systems equipped with online somatic cell count measuring units. The somatic cell count measurements were converted to elevated mastitis risk, a continuous variable [on a (0-1) scale] indicating the risk of mastitis. Risk values >0.6 were assumed to indicate that a cow had mastitis. For each cow and lactation, the sequence of health states (mastitic or healthy) was converted to a weekly transition: 0 if the cow stayed within the same state and 1 if the cow changed state. The result was 2 series of transitions: one for healthy to diseased (HD, to model mastitis susceptibility) and the other for diseased to healthy (DH, to model recovery ability). The 2 series of transitions were analyzed with bivariate threshold models, including several systematic effects and a function of time. The model included effects of herd, parity, herd-test-week, permanent environment (to account for the repetitive nature of transition records from a cow) plus two time-varying effects (lactation stage and time within episode). In early lactation, there was an increased risk of getting mastitis but the risk remained stable afterwards. Mean recovery rate was 45% per lactation. Heritabilities were 0.07 [posterior mean of standard deviations (PSD) = 0.03] for HD and 0.08 (PSD = 0.03) for DH. The genetic correlation between HD and DH has a posterior mean of -0.83 (PSD = 0.13). Although susceptibility and recovery from mastitis are strongly negatively correlated, recovery can be considered as a new trait for selection.

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Managerial and environmental determinants of clinical mastitis in Danish dairy herds

Cited by 12 publications

References 22 publications

The interrelationships between clinical signs and their effect on involuntary culling among pregnant sows in group-housing systems

The interrelationships between clinical signs and their effect on involuntary culling among pregnant sows in group-housing systems

Herd management and social variables associated with bulk tank somatic cell count in dairy herds in the eastern United States

Bivariate threshold models for genetic evaluation of susceptibility to and ability to recover from mastitis in Danish Holstein cows

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