How does reviewing the evidence change veterinary surgeons' beliefs regarding the treatment of ovine footrot? A quantitative and qualitative study

Footrot is a widespread, infectious cause of lameness in sheep, with major economic and welfare costs. The aims of this research were: (i) to quantify how veterinary surgeons’ beliefs regarding the efficacy of two treatments for footrot changed following a review of the evidence (ii) to obtain a consensus opinion following group discussions (iii) to capture complementary qualitative data to place their beliefs within a broader clinical context. Grounded in a Bayesian statistical framework, probabilistic elicitation (roulette method) was used to quantify the beliefs of eleven veterinary surgeons during two one-day workshops. There was considerable heterogeneity in veterinary surgeons’ beliefs before they listened to a review of the evidence. After hearing the evidence, seven participants quantifiably changed their beliefs. In particular, two participants who initially believed that foot trimming with topical oxytetracycline was the better treatment, changed to entirely favour systemic and topical oxytetracycline instead. The results suggest that a substantial amount of the variation in beliefs related to differences in veterinary surgeons’ knowledge of the evidence. Although considerable differences in opinion still remained after the evidence review, with several participants having non-overlapping 95% credible intervals, both groups did achieve a consensus opinion. Two key findings from the qualitative data were: (i) veterinary surgeons believed that farmers are unlikely to actively seek advice on lameness, suggesting a proactive veterinary approach is required (ii) more attention could be given to improving the way in which veterinary advice is delivered to farmers. In summary this study has: (i) demonstrated a practical method for probabilistically quantifying how veterinary surgeons’ beliefs change (ii) revealed that the evidence that currently exists is capable of changing veterinary opinion (iii) suggested that improved transfer of research knowledge into veterinary practice is needed (iv) identified some potential obstacles to the implementation of veterinary advice by farmers

The investigation on the effects of free and dependent housing types on cow foot diseases and claw deformations in turkey, mus province

This study aims to determine the effects of different housing types on cow foot diseases and claw deformations in Turkey, Mus Province. The study group consisted of 1292 animals which were randomly selected and sheltered in 48 free and 33 dependent stables between July 2011 and August 2012. The rate of deformity observed in claws of cows in free stables was found to be 61.48% while this rate was 38.16% in dependent stables. The studies found the rates of cow claw deformities in free stables as follow: 2.3% blunt claw, 3.50% scissors claw, 6.01% sharp claw, 3.13% split claw, 2.63% flat and plump claw and 4.38% twisted claw. The rates in dependent stables are as follow: 1.62% blunt claw, 1.83%) scissors claw, 3.65% sharp claw, 1.62% split claw, 1.82% flat and plump claw and 1.22% twisted claw. The rates of foot diseases of cows in free stables were found to be as follow: 3.13% heel erosion, 2.13% heel apse, 1.00%) interdigitalhyperplasia, 1.15% interdigital phlegmon, 1.38% laminitis, 1.00%) digital dermatitis, 2.63% white line disease, 4.01 % heel and plantar crush. These rates in dependent stables are as follow: 1.83%) heel erosion, 1.22%) heel apse, 0.81%) interdigital hyperplasia, 0.61% interdigital phlegmon, 2.2% laminitis, 0.81%) digital dermatitis, 0.81%) white line disease, 1.42% heel and plantar crush. © Medwell Journals, 2014

Monthly electrical energy consumption modeling using ant lion optimizer

This study concentrates on the application of ant lion optimizer in the monthly electrical energy consumption modeling. For this purpose, daily electrical energy consumption recorded for spring and summer seasons of Turkey is used as the output variable. For the same time period, daily average temperature, daily average wind speed, daily average humidity, daily average rainfall and daily total global solar radiation are utilized as the input variables affecting the electrical energy consumption. Many efficient consumption models are developed on the monthly basis and their modeling results are extensively compared in terms of different accuracy measures. In both seasons, commonly, the electrical energy consumption curves estimated by the ant lion optimizer-based exponential model shows good agreement with the actual ones