Abstract
Simple SummaryDairy cow lameness is a major problem for the industry, causing reduced animal welfare and economic loss. Digital dermatitis (DD) is a bacterial disease causing painful lesions, generally on the heels of the rear feet, and is an important cause of lameness. There appears to be individual variation between animals in susceptibility to this disease. Particular physical, physiological and behavioural factors might influence individual susceptibility, but further work is required to clarify the influence of these factors and to determine how this information could be used to develop breeding and management strategies to reduce DD prevalence.Digital dermatitis (DD) is a bacterial disease that primarily affects the skin on the heels of cattle. It is a major cause of lameness in dairy cows and a significant problem for the dairy industry in many countries, causing reduced animal welfare and economic loss. A wide range of infection levels has been found on infected farms, prompting investigations into both farm level and animal level risk factors for DD occurrence. There also appears to be individual variation between animals in susceptibility to the disease. The identification of factors affecting individual variation in susceptibility to DD might allow changes in breeding policies or herd management which could be used to reduce DD prevalence. Factors mentioned in the literature as possibly influencing individual variation in susceptibility to DD include physical factors such as hoof conformation and properties of the skin, physiological factors such as the efficacy of the immune response, and behavioural factors such as standing half in cubicles. Further work is required to determine the influence of these factors, identify the genetic basis of variation, clarify the level of heritability of DD susceptibility and to determine how this is correlated with production and health traits currently used in breeding programmes.
Highlights
Digital dermatitis (DD) is a bacterial disease that primarily affects the skin on the heels of cattle.Infection causes inflammation and skin damage, leading to pain and discomfort [1]
DD has recently been identified as an emerging issue in beef cattle in the UK [4] and the bacteria believed to cause DD have been identified in similar lesions in sheep, dairy goats [6,7] and even wild
Fiddler et al [47] report the findings of a study which evaluated a vaccine containing Serpens sp. bacterin, developed by a commercial company. They found that, the dairy cows involved in the trial did develop an immune response to the bacterin, there was no reduction in the prevalence or severity of DD infections among vaccinated cows when compared to controls
Summary
Digital dermatitis (DD) is a bacterial disease that primarily affects the skin on the heels of cattle. These DD associated bacteria have been detected in three types of severe bovine foot lesions which have emerged during the last 15 years; toe necrosis, non-healing white line disease and non-healing sole ulcer [8]. These developments highlight the growing importance of DD for domestic and wild animals, and for farmers and veterinarians. This review will begin by providing an overview of the disease and the problems that it causes, focusing where possible on new developments reported in the literature It will briefly outline the farm-level and animal-level risk factors for DD that have been described in the literature. It will introduce research that has been carried out into individual variation in susceptibility to DD
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