Serum Metabolic Parameters in Healthy and Subclinical Mastitis Cows

Abstract

Subclinical mastitis continues to be the most frequent and expensive disease of dairy cows. It negatively affects the quality of milk and economic effectiveness of farms. The purpose of the study was to identify changes that occure in some serum metabolic parameters (total protein, serum albumin, serum globulin, ALP, ASAT, GGT, CK) in healthy and subclinical mastitis cows. First objective was to diagnose subclinical mastitis using the indicator of mastitis Waikato and determining the number of somatic cells in milk using the MT-04. Following tests carried out on the 84 lactating cows, 10 of them had a positive diagnosis, representing 12% of the total lactating cows. For the 10 cows, positive diagnosis was confirmed by the increased number of somatic cells present in milk. Thus, values obtained were between 500.000 and 1.5 million cells/ml. In healthy cows, somatic cell count has not exceeded the value of 270.000 cells/ml. Total serum protein (9.14±2.74 g/dl) values and serum globulin (5.76 ±1.82 g/dl) from subclinical mastitis cows were higher compared to healthy cows. Increased proteins and globulin in the blood of cows indicate an activation of immune response following infection of the mammary gland. We obtained low values of the two enzymes, ASAT (87.20±30.16 U/l) and GGT (18.80±8.90 U/l), along with a decrease activity of CK (221.80±80.53 U/l). Contrarily, ALP activity (71.80±50.70 U/l) increased in cows diagnosed with subclinical mastitis compared with healthy cows enzymes.