March 21, 2025 • 24 mins
Ileitis is a common cause of diarrhea in grow-finish pigs. When underdiagnosed, ileitis can result in a significant amount of money being left on the table and out of producers’ pockets.
Joining our Ann Hess today to talk about ileitis and what producers can do to minimize its impact is Dr. Nate Winkelman, co-owner and veterinarian at Swine Services Unlimited.
This episode is brought to you by Pharmgate Animal Health, a growing business that puts livestock first. Pharmgate provides a proven portfolio of technically supported, high-quality products that are the foundation of custom herd health protocols. By offering multiple options for active ingredients, concentrations, and administration routes, Pharmgate provides you with choices to fit your needs and gets you the results you want.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:07):
Iliitis is a common cause of diarrhea in grow-finish
pigs.
When underdiagnosed, iliitiscan result in a significant
amount of money being left onthe table and out of producers'
pockets.
Welcome to Feedstuffs in Focus,our podcast taking a look at
the big issues affecting thelivestock, poultry grain and
animal feed industries.
I'm your host, sarah Muirhead.
(00:29):
This episode is brought to youby Farmgate Animal Health, a
growing business that putslivestock first.
Farmgate provides a provenportfolio of technically
supported, high-quality productsthat are the foundation of
custom herd health protocols.
By offering multiple optionsfor active ingredients,
concentrations andadministration routes, farmgate
(00:51):
provides you with choices to fityour needs and get you the
results that you want.
Joining our Ann Hess on thisepisode of Feedstuffs in Focus
to talk about ileitis and whatproducers can do to minimize its
impact is Dr Nate Winkleman, co-owner and veterinarian at
Swine Services Unlimited.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
Dr Winkleman, let's start by having you tell us more
about your role, your companyand the research you do there.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
Thank you for the opportunity.
My company is called SwineServices Unlimited Inc.
I'm a co-owner with Dr AdamMueller.
It's a consultation andresearch practice.
So we consult with progressivepork producers, mostly in
Minnesota and Iowa, a little bitin the Dakotas, some
international work.
But our primary focus is doingresearch with swine diseases for
(01:45):
vaccine and pharmaceuticalcompanies and some just
nutraceutical studies as well.
We research all swine diseasesSince about mid-95, I've
developed a mucosal homogenateLassoni intracellularis
challenge model that wasrecognized pivotal for the FDA
(02:09):
to approve antibiotics.
So I've been still focusing onLassoni intracellularis and
continue that work.
Speaker 2 (02:18):
And today we're talking about Lassoni
intracellularis, more commonlyknown as ileitis.
How much of a problem does thispose for producers today?
Speaker 3 (02:31):
It's a considerable problem.
Ileitis is endemic in pigs inNorth America.
It's still considered the mostcommon cause of grow finish
diarrhea.
In North America it's one ofthe two most common endemic
bacteria, along with mycoplasmaand the grow finish pigs.
I think it's a lot of moneystill left on the table because
(02:57):
subclinical and clinical ileitisis underdiagnosed and
undertreated.
Diagnosed and undertreatedDaryl Holdkamp did a really good
literature review a few yearsago showing the cost of both
subclinical and clinical ileitisto be anywhere from $6 to $16
per pig if it's identified inyour system.
(03:20):
So it's a very significant andcommon enteric problem in North
America.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
Yeah, 6 to 16, that's quite significant.
You recently shared newresearch at the American
Association of SwineVeterinarians Conference in San
Francisco on ileitis andfinishing pigs.
Can you explain more about thatstudy and the top level
findings?
Speaker 3 (03:50):
Yeah, it was a fun study for me for lots of reasons
.
I had a student intern thatwrapped his arms around it, so
I'm turning him into a pigdiarrhea expert as well.
I hope someday pig diarrheaexpert as well.
I hope someday.
That's my goal.
But it's unique in that it was.
I've tested both lincomycin andavilacin, or tilvalocin or
(04:16):
tilvalocin however you want topronounce it many times
individually, both in the feedand the water, and lincol has an
injectable as well.
But this is the first time Ihad the opportunity to test both
of them side by side in anileitis challenge model and this
was in older pigs.
It was in a 10-week-old pigwhen we challenged the pig and
(04:37):
the trial lasted for 35 days.
So it was a 10 to a 15-week-oldpig.
So it was a 10 to a 15-week-oldpig.
The trial design basically iswe had three treatment groups.
We had 170 pigs total.
The challenge control groupthere were 50 pigs in the
(04:59):
challenge control group thatreceived a very high.
All the pigs received a high 10to the 10th Lawsonia challenge.
The second group was theAbelson group.
There are 60 pigs in theAbelson group.
The third group was thelincomycin water medicated group
.
That had 60 pigs in it, alsothe pigs.
(05:21):
We waited until we saw clinicalsigns but because of the very
long incubation period of aLawsonia to cellularis we didn't
see clinical signs.
We saw on day 13 post-challenge.
10% of the pigs had clinicalsigns.
So that's when we started thefive-day treatment.
Pigs were treated from day 13to day 18.
(05:45):
We measured many parameters.
We measured clinical parametersof fecal diarrhea scores, fecal
color scores, body condition orabdominal appearance scores.
Obviously we measuredperformance parameters of
average daily gain, averagedaily feed intake and feed
conversion rate.
It was a terminal study.
(06:06):
So 35 days after the pigs werechallenged with Lawsonia, all
the pigs were euthanized and wemeasured gross PPE or PIA as
porcine intestinal adenomatosis.
That's the underlying lesion ofileitis.
You can actually see thatgrossly on the intestine.
(06:27):
We measured a severity index onday 35 when we euthanized all
the pigs.
At the end, basically, underthe constraints of this trial,
ablac or tibulocin performedbetter in all the parameters
that we measured compared tolincomycin.
(06:49):
However, both of theantibiotics were effective in
controlling the disease comparedto the controls.
So that's the bottom linesummary.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
So what results did you see for ablison having on
average daily gain and feedconversion rate, and how did
that compare to the control orother treatments?
Speaker 3 (07:16):
The performance parameters.
That's where you get into theeconomics and that's really what
we measure.
So I'm going to back up justone second and say that the
challenge was a very effectivechallenge and it's difficult to
(07:37):
challenge pigs that are.
The older the pig is, the morebacteria you have to give,
because the pig has an amazingability to hide this disease.
Diarrhea is not a commonclinical sign by the time you
see diarrhea inileitis-challenged pigs.
All the pigs are subclinicallyaffected and some are clinically
(07:57):
affected.
This was a good challengebecause we had mortality from
ileitis in the grower pig.
Two pigs died in the controlgroup, one from acute PHE or
porcine hemorrhagic enteropathyon day 18, and then one chronic
pig died on day 28 in thecontrol group.
(08:20):
One pig died from the PHE acutebloody form of biliitis on day
22 in the lancomyosin group andthere was not any mortality in
the ableson group.
To answer your question onaverage daily gain, there was
just dramatic differencesbetween the treatments and the
(08:42):
controls the control group.
When we measure average dailygain from day 13, when we
started treatment until day 35at the end of the study, the
average daily gain in thecontrol was 1.75 pounds per day
and in tilvalocin it was 2.26.
(09:04):
So that's almost 50 points.
That's amazing.
Lincomycin was at 2.07, andboth lincomycin and the
tilvalocin were statisticallysignificant compared to the
controls for average daily gain.
Feed conversion is also animportant parameter.
(09:26):
This intestinal disease causesa hyperplasia or a thickening of
the mucosa of the smallintestine.
So you can't normallyassimilate nutrients.
So both they go off feed.
So average daily gain isaffected.
But the feed conversion rate isalso significantly affected.
In this trial it was a dramaticdifference as well.
(09:50):
The Avilacin group had a 1.81feed conversion rate compared to
a 2.69 feed conversion rateover that day 13 to 35-day
period.
The lincomycin group wasintermediate.
It had a 2.16 feed conversionrate.
It wasn't statisticallysignificant at a PO5 level for
(10:14):
this study.
It probably would have been ifwe would have had more than 60
pigs, because the differenceswere still quite high
numerically.
And then, lastly, I might aswell mention the PPE severity
score differences also.
We look at the ilium first, thejejunum, the cecum and the
(10:40):
colon for these PIA lesions andwe can see and measure those.
So we measure those incentimeters and we have a scale
of zero being normal, one mild,two moderate and three severe.
So we take the lesion lengthtimes the lesion score and add
that together throughout theintestine to get a lesion
severity index.
(11:01):
Severity index the lesionscores were the lowest in the
alicin treated group.
It was statistically betterthan the controls.
That severity index of the 25was the mean score on those 60
pigs and it was 75 was thelesion severity score in the
(11:26):
controls.
And then lincomycin wasintermediate at 33 and was not
statistically better than thecontrols.
And I should say ablacin wasn'tstatistically better than the
lincomycin in these parameterseither, just numerically better.
Speaker 2 (11:45):
So before we, you know, get into the treatment, we
should probably talk about howileitis is detected and, you
know, at what thresholdproducers make the decision to
treat their herd.
Speaker 3 (11:59):
Yeah, the key is to always be on the lookout.
The key is to always be on thelookout.
Be on the lookout visually forclinical ileitis Whenever you
see abnormal diarrhea.
Our first diarrhea score is aone and that's just a soft cow,
(12:21):
pie-like diarrhea.
It's not normal diarrhea.
My producers will tell me that,doc, that's just normal
diarrhea and no, there's no suchthing as normal diarrhea.
That's my favorite saying andyou've probably heard me say
that before, but so you walk byit.
If you see clinical diarrhea ina pig that's in a grow finish
(12:43):
pig, especially a pig that's ina grow finish pig, especially a
pig that's over 100 pounds orthe fecal color score is also a
really good thing to look atvisually.
If you see blood in feces, wewe score our fecal color score
on a mild, moderate, severescore as as as well severe is a
classic black, tarry, red, blackor-black or black-red melana.
(13:05):
Two-color scora is just someblood in it.
It might be dark, brown ororange, but there aren't too
many things that are going tocause bloody diarrhea.
We don't bloody diarrhea isbrachyspira, hyaluronic acid or
hamsonia.
(13:25):
We don't have that in very manyof our farms, although it might
be on the increase.
But if you see blood,something's wrong and then get a
diagnosis, don't walk byanything clinical without
knowing what it is.
Fecal PCRs are the goldstandard anti-mortem test,
whether they're taken with adirect fecal sample or you take
(13:45):
fresh fecal samples and pool upto three to five at the most, or
if you take oral fluid samples.
Don't walk by clinical diarrheawithout knowing what it is,
because my rule of thumb, ifit's clinical in a grow-finish
pig, you've got the rest of thepopulation.
That's subclinical or clinicaland they need to be treated with
(14:09):
water medications.
It's very, very cost-effectiveto treat with water medications,
as I can talk about in abenefit-cost analysis that we
did on this study.
So that's number one.
Look at it visually.
Number two is monitor it.
So that's number one.
Look at it visually.
Number two is monitor it.
Use the fecal PCR with the oralfluids and take fecal samples
(14:30):
and routinely monitor yourfinishing barns, at least once
or twice a year, so you aren'twalking by it.
Iliitis only lasts in anindividual pig.
Iliitis will probably only lastfor 35 to 42 days.
In some bad situations theymight shed for out to 70 days
(14:53):
and the population might onlyhave ileitis in that grow-finish
barn for six weeks or twomonths, months.
So it's your job to find it andtake action if you have a
clinical diarrhea to watermedicate.
And then what we also learnedfrom this trial is the
(15:14):
correlation between fecalshedding and average daily gain.
So there was a moderatecorrelation of 0.51 in this
trial, showing that as fecalshedding decreased, that average
daily gain dramaticallydecreased also, and it had a
(15:38):
high P value.
So my rule of thumb is wheneveryou have fecal PCRs or oral
fluid samples approaching 30, aCT value of 30 at the University
of Minnesota they're in thediagnostic lab you better take
action because that meansthere's lots of fecal shedding.
And we also showed that there'sa moderate correlation between
(16:02):
fecal shedding and lesion scores.
So the more lesions you have,the more fecal shedding and
lesion scores.
So the more lesions you have,the more fecal shedding you have
and the more average daily gainand feed conversion loss you
have.
So when your CT values get downaround 30, take action and
water medicate.
Or if you see clinical diarrheawith blood or just diarrhea
(16:25):
consistency scores, then treatwith water medication because
it's very, very cost effective.
Speaker 2 (16:34):
Time is definitely of the essence, and don't walk by
those signs of clinical diarrhea.
You talked about water-solubletreatment being an effective
delivery method and looking atsome costs too with this trial.
Won't you dive into that morefor us and explain why that is
such an effective deliverymethod?
Speaker 3 (16:58):
Well, it's because of the long incubation period of
Lawsonia that that, if you, bythe time, you see, by the time
we saw clinical ileitis here andwe gave them uh, we gave them a
uh.
10 to the 10th, that's uh,that's 10, 10 million bacteria
per pig and it took 13 daysbefore you saw clinical science.
(17:20):
But by on day seven, none ofthose pigs were shedding.
Um, by day 13, 100 of thosepigs were shedding.
By day 13, 100% of those pigswere shedding and the fecal PCRs
were down in that 25 to 27 CTvalue at the University of
Minnesota.
I keep saying at the Universityof Minnesota, because the PCR
(17:41):
CTs, pcrs aren't standardizedacross labs.
So, for example, at Iowa Statethey only go through 35 cycles
to identify their Lawsonia PCRs,where at the University of
Minnesota they go through 40cycles.
So the numbers are going to bea little bit different.
But at the University ofMinnesota, for example, when you
get down to around 30 that Ijust mentioned 30 is when you do
(18:05):
a qPCR that's about five times10 to the fourth.
So that means there's 50,000Lassonia bacteria per gram of
feces and it only takessomewhere between a hundred and
a thousand bacteria to infect apig and start the whole disease
process in that population.
So you know you've got a lot ofbacteria that the pig is
spreading fecal to oralthroughout that, throughout that
(18:26):
population.
So you know you've got a lot ofbacteria that the pig is
spreading fecal to oralthroughout that population.
Regarding the cost-benefitanalysis that you asked about, I
just used some basicassumptions from today's markets
$67 per 100-weight live, $300per ton of feed.
The cost of ablison in ourstudy was 63 cents per pig for
(18:50):
that five-day period and thecost for lincomycin was 32 cents
per pig over that five-dayperiod.
So ablison was a more expensivetreatment.
However, the benefits ofAbelson outweighed those of
lincomycin and both of them weremuch, much better than the
(19:11):
controls.
For example, the extra bodyweight on day 35.
For Abelson the pigs averaged11.4 more pounds heavier on day
35.
The lincomycin pigs were sevenpounds heavier.
You put that $67 per 100-weightlive and put a value on that,
(19:33):
that's $7.50 for Abelson and$4.50 more value for the
poundage on that pig.
The feed savings and feedconversion rate for Abelson was
$3.24.
The feed savings forlinchomycin, compared to the
controls, was $1.25.
So the total benefit just inperformance.
(19:57):
I didn't look at mortality herebut there's benefit in mortality
as well.
The total benefit for Abelsonwas $10.73 just in this trial by
treating with Abelson, and itwas $5.83 for the lincomycin
water medication.
So the benefit-cost ratio.
(20:18):
When you divide that by thecost of the antibiotics, the
benefit-cost ratio turned out tobe about the same.
It was 17 to 1 for alicin and18 to 1 for lincomycin.
But the bottom line here isthat you spend 31 more cents for
antibiotic costs for alicin andit pays you back $4.90 in
(20:38):
performance improvement withaverage daily gain and feed
conversion rate.
So under the constraints ofthis trial, alicin was the
better antibiotic in thisileitis challenge.
Speaker 2 (20:54):
What other recommendations would you have
for producers that think they're, you know, seeing an ileitis
challenge?
Speaker 3 (21:05):
Well, water Medicaid, as you alluded to, is the best
treatment because we're treatingthe population.
We got to treat the subclinical.
It looks like 80% of those pigsare just fine but they're
shedding More than likelythey're shedding.
Some might be normal.
It depends upon where in thecourse of the disease they are
(21:28):
when you're taking these PCRs.
But water medication is thebest treatment for population.
But still, if you have pigsthat have bloody diarrhea or a
PHE, you need to inject thosepigs.
The best thing for thatindividual pig is an injectable
antibiotic.
For Lawsonia, lincomycin andTylen are common ones.
Also, if there was enoughdisease in this trial, if this
(21:56):
were a field outbreak, we wouldhave followed up with feed
medication.
Also, because you medicate inthe water for five days, you
still have to follow up withfeed medication for another
couple weeks after that becausethe water medication doesn't
completely stop all shedding.
It reduces shedding.
Actually the Avilacin reducedshedding 8.3 times more than the
(22:17):
lincomycin on day 21 after thewater medication was taken out.
But still, if it was a fieldoutbreak, you use all methods of
delivery.
Water medication is the best.
If they're really sick pigs youwant to inject them and you
want to follow up in thepopulation, depending upon how
(22:39):
much clinical signs you see andif you have mortality or not
with feed medication as well.
So I guess hopefully thatanswered the question.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
Yeah, no, no, as we wrap up our discussion here, any
other key takeaways you'd liketo leave our audience?
Speaker 3 (22:59):
Well, I'd like to just encourage swine
veterinarians to try to be morediligent in monitoring for
Lawsonia.
Like I said, I think we walk byit and leave money on the table
regarding subclinical for sure,and maybe even clinical.
If you think clinical diarrheais normal diarrhea, you're
(23:19):
walking by it and leaving moneyon the table, so monitor it, get
in there and hang some.
It's easy to hang oral fluids.
Easy to hang oral fluids.
It's easy to take some fecalsamples from suspect feces and
pool them for PCRs.
Know where you are and catch it.
Catch it early so you can treatit with water medication and
(23:44):
save your producer a lot ofmoney.
Speaker 2 (23:47):
Great pieces of advice, dr Nate Winkleman, with
Swine Services Unlimited.
Thank you so much for joiningus today.
Speaker 3 (23:54):
I appreciate the opportunity.
Thanks a lot.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
This episode has been brought to you by Farmgate
Animal Health, a growingbusiness that puts livestock
first.
Farmgate provides a provenportfolio of technically
supported, high quality productsthat are the foundation of
custom herd health protocols.
By offering multiple optionsfor active ingredients,
concentrations andadministration routes, farmgate
(24:19):
provides you with choices to fityour needs and get you the
results that you want.
I'm Sarah Muirhead and you havebeen listening to Feedstuffs In
Focus.
If you would like to hear moreconversations about some of the
big issues affecting thelivestock, poultry, grain and
animal feed industries,subscribe to this podcast on
your favorite podcast channel.
(24:39):
Until next time, have a greatday and thank you for listening.
Iliitis is a common cause of diarrhea in grow-finish
pigs.
When underdiagnosed, iliitiscan result in a significant
amount of money being left onthe table and out of producers'
pockets.
Welcome to Feedstuffs in Focus,our podcast taking a look at
the big issues affecting thelivestock, poultry grain and
animal feed industries.
I'm your host, sarah Muirhead.
(00:29):
This episode is brought to youby Farmgate Animal Health, a
growing business that putslivestock first.
Farmgate provides a provenportfolio of technically
supported, high-quality productsthat are the foundation of
custom herd health protocols.
By offering multiple optionsfor active ingredients,
concentrations andadministration routes, farmgate
(00:51):
provides you with choices to fityour needs and get you the
results that you want.
Joining our Ann Hess on thisepisode of Feedstuffs in Focus
to talk about ileitis and whatproducers can do to minimize its
impact is Dr Nate Winkleman, co-owner and veterinarian at
Swine Services Unlimited.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
Dr Winkleman, let's start by having you tell us more
about your role, your companyand the research you do there.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
Thank you for the opportunity.
My company is called SwineServices Unlimited Inc.
I'm a co-owner with Dr AdamMueller.
It's a consultation andresearch practice.
So we consult with progressivepork producers, mostly in
Minnesota and Iowa, a little bitin the Dakotas, some
international work.
But our primary focus is doingresearch with swine diseases for
(01:45):
vaccine and pharmaceuticalcompanies and some just
nutraceutical studies as well.
We research all swine diseasesSince about mid-95, I've
developed a mucosal homogenateLassoni intracellularis
challenge model that wasrecognized pivotal for the FDA
(02:09):
to approve antibiotics.
So I've been still focusing onLassoni intracellularis and
continue that work.
Speaker 2 (02:18):
And today we're talking about Lassoni
intracellularis, more commonlyknown as ileitis.
How much of a problem does thispose for producers today?
Speaker 3 (02:31):
It's a considerable problem.
Ileitis is endemic in pigs inNorth America.
It's still considered the mostcommon cause of grow finish
diarrhea.
In North America it's one ofthe two most common endemic
bacteria, along with mycoplasmaand the grow finish pigs.
I think it's a lot of moneystill left on the table because
(02:57):
subclinical and clinical ileitisis underdiagnosed and
undertreated.
Diagnosed and undertreatedDaryl Holdkamp did a really good
literature review a few yearsago showing the cost of both
subclinical and clinical ileitisto be anywhere from $6 to $16
per pig if it's identified inyour system.
(03:20):
So it's a very significant andcommon enteric problem in North
America.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
Yeah, 6 to 16, that's quite significant.
You recently shared newresearch at the American
Association of SwineVeterinarians Conference in San
Francisco on ileitis andfinishing pigs.
Can you explain more about thatstudy and the top level
findings?
Speaker 3 (03:50):
Yeah, it was a fun study for me for lots of reasons
.
I had a student intern thatwrapped his arms around it, so
I'm turning him into a pigdiarrhea expert as well.
I hope someday pig diarrheaexpert as well.
I hope someday.
That's my goal.
But it's unique in that it was.
I've tested both lincomycin andavilacin, or tilvalocin or
(04:16):
tilvalocin however you want topronounce it many times
individually, both in the feedand the water, and lincol has an
injectable as well.
But this is the first time Ihad the opportunity to test both
of them side by side in anileitis challenge model and this
was in older pigs.
It was in a 10-week-old pigwhen we challenged the pig and
(04:37):
the trial lasted for 35 days.
So it was a 10 to a 15-week-oldpig.
So it was a 10 to a 15-week-oldpig.
The trial design basically iswe had three treatment groups.
We had 170 pigs total.
The challenge control groupthere were 50 pigs in the
(04:59):
challenge control group thatreceived a very high.
All the pigs received a high 10to the 10th Lawsonia challenge.
The second group was theAbelson group.
There are 60 pigs in theAbelson group.
The third group was thelincomycin water medicated group
.
That had 60 pigs in it, alsothe pigs.
(05:21):
We waited until we saw clinicalsigns but because of the very
long incubation period of aLawsonia to cellularis we didn't
see clinical signs.
We saw on day 13 post-challenge.
10% of the pigs had clinicalsigns.
So that's when we started thefive-day treatment.
Pigs were treated from day 13to day 18.
(05:45):
We measured many parameters.
We measured clinical parametersof fecal diarrhea scores, fecal
color scores, body condition orabdominal appearance scores.
Obviously we measuredperformance parameters of
average daily gain, averagedaily feed intake and feed
conversion rate.
It was a terminal study.
(06:06):
So 35 days after the pigs werechallenged with Lawsonia, all
the pigs were euthanized and wemeasured gross PPE or PIA as
porcine intestinal adenomatosis.
That's the underlying lesion ofileitis.
You can actually see thatgrossly on the intestine.
(06:27):
We measured a severity index onday 35 when we euthanized all
the pigs.
At the end, basically, underthe constraints of this trial,
ablac or tibulocin performedbetter in all the parameters
that we measured compared tolincomycin.
(06:49):
However, both of theantibiotics were effective in
controlling the disease comparedto the controls.
So that's the bottom linesummary.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
So what results did you see for ablison having on
average daily gain and feedconversion rate, and how did
that compare to the control orother treatments?
Speaker 3 (07:16):
The performance parameters.
That's where you get into theeconomics and that's really what
we measure.
So I'm going to back up justone second and say that the
challenge was a very effectivechallenge and it's difficult to
(07:37):
challenge pigs that are.
The older the pig is, the morebacteria you have to give,
because the pig has an amazingability to hide this disease.
Diarrhea is not a commonclinical sign by the time you
see diarrhea inileitis-challenged pigs.
All the pigs are subclinicallyaffected and some are clinically
(07:57):
affected.
This was a good challengebecause we had mortality from
ileitis in the grower pig.
Two pigs died in the controlgroup, one from acute PHE or
porcine hemorrhagic enteropathyon day 18, and then one chronic
pig died on day 28 in thecontrol group.
(08:20):
One pig died from the PHE acutebloody form of biliitis on day
22 in the lancomyosin group andthere was not any mortality in
the ableson group.
To answer your question onaverage daily gain, there was
just dramatic differencesbetween the treatments and the
(08:42):
controls the control group.
When we measure average dailygain from day 13, when we
started treatment until day 35at the end of the study, the
average daily gain in thecontrol was 1.75 pounds per day
and in tilvalocin it was 2.26.
(09:04):
So that's almost 50 points.
That's amazing.
Lincomycin was at 2.07, andboth lincomycin and the
tilvalocin were statisticallysignificant compared to the
controls for average daily gain.
Feed conversion is also animportant parameter.
(09:26):
This intestinal disease causesa hyperplasia or a thickening of
the mucosa of the smallintestine.
So you can't normallyassimilate nutrients.
So both they go off feed.
So average daily gain isaffected.
But the feed conversion rate isalso significantly affected.
In this trial it was a dramaticdifference as well.
(09:50):
The Avilacin group had a 1.81feed conversion rate compared to
a 2.69 feed conversion rateover that day 13 to 35-day
period.
The lincomycin group wasintermediate.
It had a 2.16 feed conversionrate.
It wasn't statisticallysignificant at a PO5 level for
(10:14):
this study.
It probably would have been ifwe would have had more than 60
pigs, because the differenceswere still quite high
numerically.
And then, lastly, I might aswell mention the PPE severity
score differences also.
We look at the ilium first, thejejunum, the cecum and the
(10:40):
colon for these PIA lesions andwe can see and measure those.
So we measure those incentimeters and we have a scale
of zero being normal, one mild,two moderate and three severe.
So we take the lesion lengthtimes the lesion score and add
that together throughout theintestine to get a lesion
severity index.
(11:01):
Severity index the lesionscores were the lowest in the
alicin treated group.
It was statistically betterthan the controls.
That severity index of the 25was the mean score on those 60
pigs and it was 75 was thelesion severity score in the
(11:26):
controls.
And then lincomycin wasintermediate at 33 and was not
statistically better than thecontrols.
And I should say ablacin wasn'tstatistically better than the
lincomycin in these parameterseither, just numerically better.
Speaker 2 (11:45):
So before we, you know, get into the treatment, we
should probably talk about howileitis is detected and, you
know, at what thresholdproducers make the decision to
treat their herd.
Speaker 3 (11:59):
Yeah, the key is to always be on the lookout.
The key is to always be on thelookout.
Be on the lookout visually forclinical ileitis Whenever you
see abnormal diarrhea.
Our first diarrhea score is aone and that's just a soft cow,
(12:21):
pie-like diarrhea.
It's not normal diarrhea.
My producers will tell me that,doc, that's just normal
diarrhea and no, there's no suchthing as normal diarrhea.
That's my favorite saying andyou've probably heard me say
that before, but so you walk byit.
If you see clinical diarrhea ina pig that's in a grow finish
(12:43):
pig, especially a pig that's ina grow finish pig, especially a
pig that's over 100 pounds orthe fecal color score is also a
really good thing to look atvisually.
If you see blood in feces, wewe score our fecal color score
on a mild, moderate, severescore as as as well severe is a
classic black, tarry, red, blackor-black or black-red melana.
(13:05):
Two-color scora is just someblood in it.
It might be dark, brown ororange, but there aren't too
many things that are going tocause bloody diarrhea.
We don't bloody diarrhea isbrachyspira, hyaluronic acid or
hamsonia.
(13:25):
We don't have that in very manyof our farms, although it might
be on the increase.
But if you see blood,something's wrong and then get a
diagnosis, don't walk byanything clinical without
knowing what it is.
Fecal PCRs are the goldstandard anti-mortem test,
whether they're taken with adirect fecal sample or you take
(13:45):
fresh fecal samples and pool upto three to five at the most, or
if you take oral fluid samples.
Don't walk by clinical diarrheawithout knowing what it is,
because my rule of thumb, ifit's clinical in a grow-finish
pig, you've got the rest of thepopulation.
That's subclinical or clinicaland they need to be treated with
(14:09):
water medications.
It's very, very cost-effectiveto treat with water medications,
as I can talk about in abenefit-cost analysis that we
did on this study.
So that's number one.
Look at it visually.
Number two is monitor it.
So that's number one.
Look at it visually.
Number two is monitor it.
Use the fecal PCR with the oralfluids and take fecal samples
(14:30):
and routinely monitor yourfinishing barns, at least once
or twice a year, so you aren'twalking by it.
Iliitis only lasts in anindividual pig.
Iliitis will probably only lastfor 35 to 42 days.
In some bad situations theymight shed for out to 70 days
(14:53):
and the population might onlyhave ileitis in that grow-finish
barn for six weeks or twomonths, months.
So it's your job to find it andtake action if you have a
clinical diarrhea to watermedicate.
And then what we also learnedfrom this trial is the
(15:14):
correlation between fecalshedding and average daily gain.
So there was a moderatecorrelation of 0.51 in this
trial, showing that as fecalshedding decreased, that average
daily gain dramaticallydecreased also, and it had a
(15:38):
high P value.
So my rule of thumb is wheneveryou have fecal PCRs or oral
fluid samples approaching 30, aCT value of 30 at the University
of Minnesota they're in thediagnostic lab you better take
action because that meansthere's lots of fecal shedding.
And we also showed that there'sa moderate correlation between
(16:02):
fecal shedding and lesion scores.
So the more lesions you have,the more fecal shedding and
lesion scores.
So the more lesions you have,the more fecal shedding you have
and the more average daily gainand feed conversion loss you
have.
So when your CT values get downaround 30, take action and
water medicate.
Or if you see clinical diarrheawith blood or just diarrhea
(16:25):
consistency scores, then treatwith water medication because
it's very, very cost effective.
Speaker 2 (16:34):
Time is definitely of the essence, and don't walk by
those signs of clinical diarrhea.
You talked about water-solubletreatment being an effective
delivery method and looking atsome costs too with this trial.
Won't you dive into that morefor us and explain why that is
such an effective deliverymethod?
Speaker 3 (16:58):
Well, it's because of the long incubation period of
Lawsonia that that, if you, bythe time, you see, by the time
we saw clinical ileitis here andwe gave them uh, we gave them a
uh.
10 to the 10th, that's uh,that's 10, 10 million bacteria
per pig and it took 13 daysbefore you saw clinical science.
(17:20):
But by on day seven, none ofthose pigs were shedding.
Um, by day 13, 100 of thosepigs were shedding.
By day 13, 100% of those pigswere shedding and the fecal PCRs
were down in that 25 to 27 CTvalue at the University of
Minnesota.
I keep saying at the Universityof Minnesota, because the PCR
(17:41):
CTs, pcrs aren't standardizedacross labs.
So, for example, at Iowa Statethey only go through 35 cycles
to identify their Lawsonia PCRs,where at the University of
Minnesota they go through 40cycles.
So the numbers are going to bea little bit different.
But at the University ofMinnesota, for example, when you
get down to around 30 that Ijust mentioned 30 is when you do
(18:05):
a qPCR that's about five times10 to the fourth.
So that means there's 50,000Lassonia bacteria per gram of
feces and it only takessomewhere between a hundred and
a thousand bacteria to infect apig and start the whole disease
process in that population.
So you know you've got a lot ofbacteria that the pig is
spreading fecal to oralthroughout that, throughout that
(18:26):
population.
So you know you've got a lot ofbacteria that the pig is
spreading fecal to oralthroughout that population.
Regarding the cost-benefitanalysis that you asked about, I
just used some basicassumptions from today's markets
$67 per 100-weight live, $300per ton of feed.
The cost of ablison in ourstudy was 63 cents per pig for
(18:50):
that five-day period and thecost for lincomycin was 32 cents
per pig over that five-dayperiod.
So ablison was a more expensivetreatment.
However, the benefits ofAbelson outweighed those of
lincomycin and both of them weremuch, much better than the
(19:11):
controls.
For example, the extra bodyweight on day 35.
For Abelson the pigs averaged11.4 more pounds heavier on day
35.
The lincomycin pigs were sevenpounds heavier.
You put that $67 per 100-weightlive and put a value on that,
(19:33):
that's $7.50 for Abelson and$4.50 more value for the
poundage on that pig.
The feed savings and feedconversion rate for Abelson was
$3.24.
The feed savings forlinchomycin, compared to the
controls, was $1.25.
So the total benefit just inperformance.
(19:57):
I didn't look at mortality herebut there's benefit in mortality
as well.
The total benefit for Abelsonwas $10.73 just in this trial by
treating with Abelson, and itwas $5.83 for the lincomycin
water medication.
So the benefit-cost ratio.
(20:18):
When you divide that by thecost of the antibiotics, the
benefit-cost ratio turned out tobe about the same.
It was 17 to 1 for alicin and18 to 1 for lincomycin.
But the bottom line here isthat you spend 31 more cents for
antibiotic costs for alicin andit pays you back $4.90 in
(20:38):
performance improvement withaverage daily gain and feed
conversion rate.
So under the constraints ofthis trial, alicin was the
better antibiotic in thisileitis challenge.
Speaker 2 (20:54):
What other recommendations would you have
for producers that think they're, you know, seeing an ileitis
challenge?
Speaker 3 (21:05):
Well, water Medicaid, as you alluded to, is the best
treatment because we're treatingthe population.
We got to treat the subclinical.
It looks like 80% of those pigsare just fine but they're
shedding More than likelythey're shedding.
Some might be normal.
It depends upon where in thecourse of the disease they are
(21:28):
when you're taking these PCRs.
But water medication is thebest treatment for population.
But still, if you have pigsthat have bloody diarrhea or a
PHE, you need to inject thosepigs.
The best thing for thatindividual pig is an injectable
antibiotic.
For Lawsonia, lincomycin andTylen are common ones.
Also, if there was enoughdisease in this trial, if this
(21:56):
were a field outbreak, we wouldhave followed up with feed
medication.
Also, because you medicate inthe water for five days, you
still have to follow up withfeed medication for another
couple weeks after that becausethe water medication doesn't
completely stop all shedding.
It reduces shedding.
Actually the Avilacin reducedshedding 8.3 times more than the
(22:17):
lincomycin on day 21 after thewater medication was taken out.
But still, if it was a fieldoutbreak, you use all methods of
delivery.
Water medication is the best.
If they're really sick pigs youwant to inject them and you
want to follow up in thepopulation, depending upon how
(22:39):
much clinical signs you see andif you have mortality or not
with feed medication as well.
So I guess hopefully thatanswered the question.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
Yeah, no, no, as we wrap up our discussion here, any
other key takeaways you'd liketo leave our audience?
Speaker 3 (22:59):
Well, I'd like to just encourage swine
veterinarians to try to be morediligent in monitoring for
Lawsonia.
Like I said, I think we walk byit and leave money on the table
regarding subclinical for sure,and maybe even clinical.
If you think clinical diarrheais normal diarrhea, you're
(23:19):
walking by it and leaving moneyon the table, so monitor it, get
in there and hang some.
It's easy to hang oral fluids.
Easy to hang oral fluids.
It's easy to take some fecalsamples from suspect feces and
pool them for PCRs.
Know where you are and catch it.
Catch it early so you can treatit with water medication and
(23:44):
save your producer a lot ofmoney.
Speaker 2 (23:47):
Great pieces of advice, dr Nate Winkleman, with
Swine Services Unlimited.
Thank you so much for joiningus today.
Speaker 3 (23:54):
I appreciate the opportunity.
Thanks a lot.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
This episode has been brought to you by Farmgate
Animal Health, a growingbusiness that puts livestock
first.
Farmgate provides a provenportfolio of technically
supported, high quality productsthat are the foundation of
custom herd health protocols.
By offering multiple optionsfor active ingredients,
concentrations andadministration routes, farmgate
(24:19):
provides you with choices to fityour needs and get you the
results that you want.
I'm Sarah Muirhead and you havebeen listening to Feedstuffs In
Focus.
If you would like to hear moreconversations about some of the
big issues affecting thelivestock, poultry, grain and
animal feed industries,subscribe to this podcast on
your favorite podcast channel.
(24:39):
Until next time, have a greatday and thank you for listening.
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