Iron treatment of pregnant sows in a Danish herd without iron deficiency anemia did not improve sow and piglet hematology or stillbirth rate

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Association between hematological status at weaning and weight gain post-weaning in piglets

AbstractThe objective of the study was to determine the associations between hematological parameters at weaning and post-weaning weight gain in piglets. Five well-managed conventional herds of average herd size of 1000 sows were selected. All herds provided a single injectable iron (either i.m. or s.c, 200mg) supplementation from different commerical products at 3–4 days of life. Within each herd, litters belonging to a weekly farrowing batch close to weaning were identified and among them 20 litters were chosen randomly after exclusion of nursing sows. Within each litter, a random piglet was selected. EDTA and non-stabilized blood sample was taken from the anterior Vena cava of each piglet 1–3 days before weaning (average weaning age of 25.7 days) and analyzed by complete hematology including serum iron and total iron binding capacity (TIBC). The associations between each measured hematological parameter and the average daily gain (ADG) of piglets in a three-week period were tested using PROC MIXED procedure in SAS. A total of 99 piglets were included in the study but 3 were lost during follow up. The average hemoglobin concentration of piglets was 121.5±15gl−1 and the ADG was 202.9±78.4g day−1. A positive association between hemoglobin and ADG in the three-week period (p=0.0003) was observed. Also, red blood cells (p<0.0001) and hematocrit (p=0.0005) had positive association with ADG while red blood cell distribution width (p=0.05), hemoglobin distribution width (p=0.04), and reticulocyte red cell distribution width (p=0.01) had a negative association with ADG. Hence the results indicate that improved hematological status at weaning is positively correlated to weight gain post-weaning. An increase in 10g hemoglobin/l blood corresponded to a weight gain improvement of 17.2g daily weight gain in the 3 weeks post-weaning period. The strategies for improving the hematological values of piglets at weaning need to be further investigated

Stillbirths in relation to sow hematological parameters at farrowing: A cohort study

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Hematologic reference intervals of Danish sows at mid-gestation

Hematologic reference intervals are useful tools for interpretation of laboratory results in swine practice and research. Until now, there were no hematologic reference intervals established for gestating Danish sows and those established in other countries are either out-dated, produced using very few sows or incomplete with few variables. In the past few decades there have been signifcant increases in litter size due to breeding, as well as the development of new analytical procedures for hematology and statistical procedures for calculating reference intervals. Therefore, hematologic reference intervals representing current pig production and technology are greatly needed. The main objective of this study was to provide updated and complete hematologic reference intervals for Danish sows at mid-gestation. Blood samples were collected at mid-gestation from 248 sows belonging to fve commercial herds in Denmark and the samples were analysed for several hematologic variables using the Advia 2120i Hematology System. The reference intervals were calculated according to the guidelines of American Society for Veterinary Clinical Pathology. The reference interval for hemoglobin concentration was 103.1–145.0 g/L. For red blood cells, hematocrit and mean corpuscular volume, the 95% reference intervals were 4.98–7.50×1012/L, 0.32–0.47 L/L, 57.0–69.3 fL, respectively. The reference intervals established in this study are diferent from those previously reported in the literature. These reference intervals add to the current knowledge and will be useful in the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of several disease conditions in gestating sow populations