Health planning has many benefits in terms of improved animal performance and disease prevention. Leading large animal vet David Black starts this series of five Academy articles on health planning, outlining those benefits.
What is farm health planning?
Initially health plans were seen as a necessary evil associated with various assurance schemes - focused on putting in place quickly and at least cost complex documents merely to satisfy an audit, with little attention paid to the impact on animal health. However, "Health Planning" is actually a concept and state of mind rather than a dusty unopened document on a shelf.
It is a dynamic process, using risk assessment and measurement of disease levels on your unit, while agreeing an approach to prevent and control those diseases relevant to your enterprise and hence improve productivity. Once accepted, health planning then evolves into health monitoring - you need to be able to measure a health parameter before you can understand its impact or attempt to influence it.
What is biosecurity?
Prior to the 2001 foot-and-mouth epidemic, few had heard the term biosecurity and it then became synonymous with disinfectant mats and boot washes. At farm level, biosecurity is really about preventing - or at least reducing risk of - disease-causing agents entering, and/or spreading within the unit.
However, measures taken to control one disease may have a negative impact on another - for example, feeding pooled colostrum may help control calf scour, yet concurrently spread Johne's disease. Biosecurity is important at farm level and on a regional and national level - it has many facets, yet a breakdown in biosecurity can be truly catastrophic, as demonstrated on a national scale in 2001. Introduction of disease into a single naïve and unvaccinated unit can often cost the producer many thousands of pounds through deaths, lost productivity and increased vet costs.
Incoming stock policy
An incoming stock policy is one pillar of any biosecurity plan and, therefore, of Health Planning. There are four key areas to consider:
- Enquiries: Check with the vendor of the animals. he should be happy to tell you about the health status of those animals. It is imperative the stock are of a suitable health status for your farm. Remember the risks can go both ways - from incomers to indigenous stock, but also new stock may be at heightened risk from endemic disease on your farm
- Quarantine: You should have an agreed facility and timescale in place, depending on the class of stock joining the unit and the risks
- Testing: It is often advisable to test incoming animals, or a selection of them if in larger numbers, to assess health status
- Treatments: In some circumstances it may be necessary to treat as animals arrive, allowing time for any treatment to be effective before they join the main group.
Measuring, recording and risk assessment
The basis of any control programme has to be an understanding of the risks and some way of quantifying them. You and your vet will be aware of the diseases on your farm. Your vet practice will hold a file of any test results and diagnoses that have been made and you should have a simple way of recording agreed health parameters on a daily basis - this can be paper-based, via diary or calendar, or computer-based, but should be easy and convenient. Together you can then decide what the high risks are for your unit - a calf-rearing unit near a busy main road will have entirely different risks from an extensive hill-lambing flock of sheep.
SMART targets and SOPs
Agreeing objectives is key to any health planning initiative and the best way to do this is by setting SMART targets:
Specific - "I want to reduce pneumonia incidence in my calves to less than five cases a year"
Measurable - "I currently have 15 cases a year"
Achievable - "I will consult my vet, adapt my buildings and use appropriate vaccines"
Relevant - "This will increase my productivity by an estimated 15%"
Time-based - "I want to do this within 12 months"
Many livestock producers will already have SMART targets in their heads, but these will not always be formalised or followed through.
"Standard operating procedures" (SOPs) is another phrase borrowed from industry and simply means an agreed approach to a specific situation which usually requires a degree of training and competence. The SOP may relate to routines such as castrating, foot trimming, worming etc, or may be an agreed response to a disease situation - for example, does everyone on your farm know what is the treatment protocol when a lamb is suspected of having pneumonia does everyone give the same is the agreed treatment the same for the first case as the sixth case?
Targeting efforts
It is important efforts are targeted to maximise effectiveness of input and resources. Agree with your vet which areas are going to yield the greatest return initially and concentrate on those - once those are mastered you can move on to other areas. Ask your vet about the likely cost benefits of various interventions. There are often a few easy wins, but remember the mantra "If it ain't broke, don't fix it!"
Training
A major prerequisite in the improvement of animal health is appropriately motivated, skilled and trained staff. It is vital those staff being asked to carry out what may seem mundane and time consuming tasks fully understand and appreciate the significance of their role. There are many good opportunities for training, either through formal courses or simply evening meetings - attendance should be encouraged, so that knowledge can be gained and maintained.
Vet and consultant involvement
Over recent years, the vet's role on a livestock unit has changed, with a dramatic shift from providing a reactive fire-brigade emergency call-out service to a proactive, preventative health approach, working with our clients to enhance health, welfare and production on their units. We should be seen as experts in health not experts in disease.
Most vets still get great satisfaction from a successful calving or lambing, or an individual sick animal's recovery - but forward thinking vets are also enthusiastic about preventing disease in the first place. We are keen to develop synergies with other professionals who are involved with any livestock unit, with the nutritionist a key part of that team, but not forgetting foot-trimmers, dairy hygiene and milk quality advisors, financial advisors, stock marketing advisors. Using an agreed Health Plan, which all team players must be aware of, buy into and work with is fundamental to the optimum productivity of any unit.
Cost-effectiveness
Vets, nutritionists and other consultants are often seen as an expense. However, when you choose the right people to work with on your livestock unit and develop a team ethos - with them working alongside you and with each other, to the benefit of the animals - then the outlay becomes a wise investment.
Likewise, vet medicines can be deemed to be a cost, but prevention is always better than cure, and when a relatively small investment in vaccines, disinfectants, anthelmintics or other preventative medicine saves later losses in the form of deaths, lowered production, labour and treatment costs, then surely this again is a sensible choice.
Summary
Embracing health planning as a concept is imperative for optimal performance of livestock units. Many aspects of health planning are already in place on units, so now is a good time to consolidate and formalise those plans. There have been notable successes which we can build on, such as the BVD eradication scheme in Orkney, as well as many other pilot schemes planned for other diseases.
Disease is not inevitable. Invest in health, don't pay for disease.