What question did this study set out to answer?

To determine whether routine records from a national dairy database can accurately identify dairy herds suffering from poor animal welfare.

November 1, 2009Animal Welfare

Using a national dairy database to identify herds with poor welfare

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To determine whether routine records from a national dairy database can accurately identify dairy herds suffering from poor animal welfare.
Assessed animal-based welfare metrics across calves, young stock, and cows in 55 randomly selected herds in Sweden, evaluating body condition, cleanliness, lameness, injuries, and rising behaviour.
Defined poor-welfare case herds (13 of 55 herds) as those scoring in the worst 10% on two or more of the nine on-farm welfare measurements.
Evaluated 65 expert-selected candidate welfare indicators extracted from pre-collected national dairy registry data to assess herd-level classification performance.
A database model incorporating two fertility measures and calf mortality correctly classified 77% of herds, achieving a sensitivity of 0.62.
Incorporating cow and young stock mortality into the model correctly classified 76% of herds and increased sensitivity to 0.77.

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Implication

Observational study reveals routine national dairy database metrics predict poor herd welfare in cattle, suggesting an effective screening tool to guide veterinary advisory services.

Cite This Study

Sandgren et al. (2009) studied this question.

synapsesocial.com/papers/6aa6c38d39a5015a928e601a https://doi.org/10.1017/s0962728600000944

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Implication

Observational study reveals routine national dairy database metrics predict poor herd welfare in cattle, suggesting an effective screening tool to guide veterinary advisory services.

Using a national dairy database to identify herds with poor welfare

Key Points

Discussion

Implication

Cite This Study

Using a national dairy database to identify herds with poor welfare

Key Points

Discussion

Implication

Cite This Study

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