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ARS Home » Midwest Area » Ames, Iowa » National Animal Disease Center » Ruminant Diseases and Immunology Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #203668
Title: Tracking down the nutrition/disease connection

Author
item Goff, Jesse
item HAMMON, DOUGLAS - UTAH STATE UNIVERSITY
item DHIMAN, TILAK - UTAH STATE UNIVERSITY
item EVJEN, INGRID - UTAH STATE UNIVERSITY
item WALTERS, J - UTAH STATE UNIVERSITY
item KIMURA, KAYOKO - USDA, ARS

Submitted to: Hoard's Dairyman
Publication Type: Trade Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 8/28/2006
Publication Date: 10/25/2006
Citation: Goff, J.P., Hammon, D., Dhiman, T., Evjen, I., Walters, J.L., Kimura, K. 2006. Tracking down the nutrition/disease connection. Hoard's Dairyman. 151(18):705.

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: Around the time of calving the immune system of the cow often breaks down. The neutrophils and macrophages lose much of their ability to kill bacteria and the lymphocytes fail to produce adequate antibody. This immune suppression is largely responsible for the high incidence of mastitis in fresh cows. It also helps explain why asymptomatic cows carrying bacteria that cause Johne’s disease or Salmonellosis break with clinical symptoms shortly after calving. We now know the metabolic demands for milk production are partly to blame, since experimentally mastectomized cows retain nearly full function of their immune system after calving while there is a 30-40% reduction in immune response in cows with intact udders. Metabolic demands for milk production cause many cows to go into negative energy, protein, and calcium balance in early lactation. The more severe the imbalance, the more severe the impact on the immune system. Around 20-30% of cows will develop metritis, which is characterized by a foul-smelling, red-brown, watery discharge from the uterus within 10-14 days after calving. It is often, but not always, accompanied by a fever. We recently discovered that neutrophils of cows with metritis are significantly less able to kill bacteria (measured by our iodination assay) than neutrophils from cows without metritis. The surprise was that poor neutrophil function was evident in these cows the day of calving - before lactation began and before any bacteria could have entered the uterus. Immune suppression is linked to poor feed intake prior to calving and the diseases this causes may not become evident until weeks later.