Initiating a Swine Production Medicine Program

The role of veterinary medicine in the United States food animal industry is currently changing. Veterinarians are no longer viewed as mere providers of clinical services such as healing individual sick animals. This traditional role is being replaced with planned animal health programs for the entire herd. The objective of production medicine is to consistently maintain overall animal health and increase production cost-effectively to attain optimum economic returns for the producer. This holistic approach to animal health and production reduces the importance of specific infectious agents per se, and concentrates on the effect of interactions of these agents, environment, nutrition, genetics, and management on animal performance. Attempting to assimilate all these factors, in hopes of developing specific recommendations for the producer, may seem overwhelming when starting a production medicine program. This case report will illustrate the diagnostic procedures used to evaluate these factors when initiating a program for a swine herd in central Iowa

Cost Benefits of Coccidiosis Prevention in a Feedlot

The objective of today\u27s food animal enterprise is to produce a quality product while at the same time providing maximum economic return to the producer. Many factors are involved, including herd health programs, which work to maintain animal health and to decrease economic losses due to disease. A herd health preventive medicine program will increase the costs of production, but it will increase the economic returns if the level of performance is improved

Immunologic and virologic findings in a bull chronically infected with noncytopathic bovine viral diarrhea virus

In February 1985, a 2-year-old bull with inappetence and weight loss of 1-week duration was examined by the field services staff of the Iowa State University College of Veterinary Medicine. The bull had a normal rectal temperature, decreased rumen activity, and loose feces and walked with a stiff gait. The hemogram was normal for hemoglobin concentration, PCV, and total plasma protein concentration, but the bull had a leukopenia which was primarily attributable to an absolute lymphopenia. Treatment consisted of antimicrobial drugs, an antidiarrheal medication, and a nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory and analgesic drug. After 3 weeks without improvement, the bull was admitted to the Iowa State University Large Animal Hospital

Immunologic and virologic findings in a bull chronically infected with noncytopathic bovine viral diarrhea virus

In February 1985, a 2-year-old bull with inappetence and weight loss of 1-week duration was examined by the field services staff of the Iowa State University College of Veterinary Medicine. The bull had a normal rectal temperature, decreased rumen activity, and loose feces and walked with a stiff gait. The hemogram was normal for hemoglobin concentration, PCV, and total plasma protein concentration, but the bull had a leukopenia which was primarily attributable to an absolute lymphopenia. Treatment consisted of antimicrobial drugs, an antidiarrheal medication, and a nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory and analgesic drug. After 3 weeks without improvement, the bull was admitted to the Iowa State University Large Animal Hospital.This article is published as Bolin, S.R., J.A. Roth, E.K. Uhlenhopp, and J.F. Pohlenz. 1987. Immunologic and virologic findings from a case of chronic bovine viral diarrhea. J Am Vet Med Assoc, 190:1015-1017. </p

Animal and Human Multidrug-Resistant, Cephalosporin-Resistant Salmonella Isolates Expressing a Plasmid-Mediated CMY-2 AmpC β-Lactamase

Salmonella spp. are important food-borne pathogens that are demonstrating increasing antimicrobial resistance rates in isolates obtained from food animals and humans. In this study, 10 multidrug-resistant, cephalosporin-resistant Salmonella isolates from bovine, porcine, and human sources from a single geographic region were identified. All isolates demonstrated resistance to cephamycins and extended-spectrum cephalosporins as well as tetracycline, chloramphenicol, streptomycin, and sulfisoxazole. Molecular epidemiological analyses revealed eight distinct chromosomal DNA patterns, suggesting that clonal spread could not entirely explain the distribution of this antimicrobial resistance phenotype. However, all isolates encoded an AmpC-like β-lactamase, CMY-2. Eight isolates contained a large nonconjugative plasmid that could transform Escherichia coli. Transformants coexpressed cephalosporin, tetracycline, chloramphenicol, streptomycin, and sulfisoxazole resistances. Plasmid DNA revealed highly related restriction fragments though plasmids appeared to have undergone some evolution over time. Multidrug-resistant, cephalosporin-resistant Salmonella spp. present significant therapeutic problems in animal and human health care and raise further questions about the association between antimicrobial resistance, antibiotic use in animals, and transfer of multidrug-resistant Salmonella spp. between animals and man