Evaluation of ear skin temperature as a cow-side test to predict postpartum calcium status in dairy cows

[Body temperature measurement in pigs: Are infrared thermometers a non-invasive alternative?]

OBJECTIVE

Internal body temperature is an essential parameter in evaluation an animal's general health status. The rectal temperature as 'gold standard' requires restraining of the animal which may cause stress especially when not accustomed to handling procedures. Stress on the other hand should whenever possible be avoided as it negatively affects animal welfare and may increase body temperature. The present study evaluated whether measuring the body surface temperature with an infrared thermometer (IRT) may represent a stressless alternative method to rectal body temperature measurements.

MATERIAL AND METHODS

Twelve male fattening pigs were included in the study. Body temperature was measured once a week for 11 weeks. Body surface temperature measurements were performed in the areas of the forehead, caudal base of the ear and anus using two infrared thermometers (IRT1 and IRT2) each.

RESULTS

Throughout the study, all pigs were clinically healthy. Best repeatability was found for the rectal thermometer and IRT1 in the anus region. Homogeneity of variance was not found for the measurements of the three thermometers. Mean values of body temperature were significantly different (p<0,05) between thermometers and measurement points. Thereby, the type of thermometer and measurement point possessed a moderate to strong effect. The Bland-Altman plot shows that differences in the values of the thermometers and measurement points are within the acceptable range of variation (95% interval). However, the range of variation is too substantial for clinical assessment of the body temperature.

CONCLUSION

The repeatability of temperature data measured with IRT on the body surface of pigs is acceptable. For this procedure, restraining the animals is not necessary, therefore reducing the animal's stress level during the clinical examination. However, the correlation to the rectal body temperature is weak to moderate.

CLINICAL RELEVANCE

In order to use IRT for health monitoring in animals, reference values for respective IRT and measurement points need to be established. In the current study no case of hyper- or hypothermia occurred. Further research is warrented to evaluate whether IRT reliably detect fever.

Ursache, Verbreitung und evidenzbasierte Therapie sowie Prävention der peripartalen Hypokalzämie

Die peripartale Hypokalzämie ist eine weit verbreitete Stoffwechselstörung, dessen klinische Form etwa 7 % der Milchkühe und dessen subklinische Form fast jede 2. multipare Kuh betrifft. Obwohl sich hinsichtlich Diagnostik und Therapie in den letzten 30 Jahren kaum etwas verändert hat, herrscht bei Landwirten und Tierärzten Unklarheit über die Prävalenz und den Risikozeitraum dieser Stoffwechselstörung. Darüber hinaus gibt es sehr unterschiedliche Angaben darüber, wieviel Kalzium einer Kuh mit klinischer Hypokalzämie substituiert werden sollte. Ziel dieses Übersichtsartikels ist es, die Entstehung und Verbreitung von Hypokalzämie evidenzbasiert darzustellen. Des Weiteren werden die Ergebnisse älterer und neuer Studien zusammengefast, mit dem Ziel eine möglichst genaue Empfehlung zur Behandlung von klinischer Hypokalzämie zu geben. Da in einer 2017 durchgeführten Studie gezeigt wurde, dass der überwiegende Teil deutscher Milchviehbetriebe keine Prophylaxe gegen Hypokalzämie betreibt, werden in dem letzten Teil dieser Arbeit die verschiedenen Prophylaxekonzepte, unter Berücksichtigung der aktuellen Literatur, dargestellt.

Postoperative wound assessment in cattle: How reliable is the back hand palpation?

Background

As part of clinical wound assessment in bovine surgery, discrepancies in skin temperature are evaluated by placing the back of the hand on the area to be examined. Generally, an increased skin temperature at the wound site for a prolonged period is considered as an indicator of impaired wound healing.

The aim of this study was to verify the reliability of palpation under bovine practice conditions using laparotomy as an example. Fourteen cows (German Holstein) with a left displacement of the abomasum (LDA) without other severe concurrent diseases were examined preoperatively and once daily for ten days after surgery. The skin temperature of the wound site in the right flank was assessed by palpation, followed by thermographic evaluation using an infrared camera after a 45-min acclimatisation period, under standardised conditions in a closed examination room daily for 10 days.

Results

All the incisions healed without clinical detectable perturbances. The ambient temperature range during the study period was 7.8 − 24.1 °C. Two groups were retrospectively defined according to the ambient temperature: high ambient temperature (HT group; median: 20.2 °C 25/75 quartile: 18.5 °C / 21.7 °C; n = 6) and low ambient temperature (LT group; 10.8 °C; 9.4 °C / 12.8 °C; n = 8). The temperature differences (Δϑ) between the mean skin temperature of the wound site and a defined reference area cranial to the wound were assessed. A significant negative correlation was found between the ambient temperature (ϑ_Amb) and Δϑ (r=-0.51; P < 0.001). The Δϑ was postoperatively higher in the cows in the LT group (median of the individual animals 0.8–2.5 °C) than in the HT group (0.1–0.5 °C; P < 0.05). In contrast to the thermographic findings, manual palpation rarely detected local hyperthermia (> 1 °C) at the wound site (sensitivity 0.20; specificity 0.96).

Conclusions

The infrared thermography provides a more reliable assessment of temperature changes at the wound site in comparison to manual palpation. The ambient temperature markedly affects the extent of local hyperthermia at the wound site.

Short communication: Diagnosis and classification of clinical and subclinical mastitis utilizing a dynamometer and a handheld infrared thermometer

In times of ongoing automatization of dairy cow husbandry, objective and reliable tools for mastitis diagnostic are highly in demand. The objective of this study was to investigate the diagnostic value of a handheld dynamometer and an infrared thermometer to diagnose and score clinical and subclinical mastitis and to compare those values with results from palpation of the udder tissue. Overall, 218 cows with clinical mastitis (i.e., 46 mild, 106 moderate, and 66 severe cases), 142 with subclinical mastitis, and 68 healthy cows were enrolled. Our data provide evidence that the dynamometer is an accurate diagnostic tool to differentiate between healthy udder quarters, and those with subclinical and clinical mastitis. Furthermore, the severity score of clinical mastitis can be estimated by dynamometer. The firmness threshold for the detection of clinical mastitis was 1.002 kg. Using a threshold of 1.175 kg in clinical mastitis quarters, it was possible to differentiate between negative and positive bacteriological results. A differentiation between healthy and clinical mastitis quarters with the infrared thermometer was possible, albeit udder surface temperatures were highly influenced by ambient temperature. Udder surface temperature increased by 0.15 to 0.18°C for each degree of ambient temperature. In conclusion, the utility of an infrared thermometer to estimate the udder health status of dairy cows is limited, whereas the handheld dynamometer appeared to be an accurate and objective method.