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Mitigating Pain is Not a Pain in the Neck
Dr. John Campbell
Western College of Veterinary Medicine
What was the most difficult issue to come to consensus on?
PAINFUL PROCEDURES
a) Dehorning
b) Branding
c) Castration
How can we measure pain in cattle?
Measuring Pain: Biological responses
Production responses a) Feed Intake, Average Daily Gain
Heart rate
EEG Responses (Brain waves)
Cortisol (Stress hormone) a) Blood, saliva, hair
Neuropeptide Substance P
Thermography (Heat and inflammation)
Measuring Pain: Behavioural Responses
Stride length
Pedometers (steps taken)
Accelerometers (Standing and Lying time)
Chute behaviour (Strain gauges)
Exit Speed from Chute
Vocalization
Videography to measure behaviour a) Count tail flicking, head shakes etc.
Visual Scoring Systems
Anesthetics A substance that causes lack of feeling or awareness,
dulling pain to permit surgery and other painful procedures
In cattle we primarily use local anesthetics: eg: Lidocaine
Analgesics Medicines that relieve pain
a) Non steroidal Anti-inflammatory Drugs (NSAIDS)
• Drugs similar to aspirin or ibuprofen
b) Products licensed for cattle in Canada:
• Ketoprofen (Anafen)
• Flunixin (Banamine)
• Meloxicam (Metacam)
• Oral Meloxicam solution
c) Sedatives such as xylazine (Rompun) also may provide some pain control (analgesia)
Dehorning and Pain Control
Requirements
Dehorning must be performed by competent personnel using proper, clean, well maintained instruments and accepted techniques
Seek guidance from your veterinarian on the availability and advisability of pain control for disbudding or dehorning beef cattle
Disbud calves as early as practically possible, while horn development is still at the horn bud stage (<2-3 months)
Effective Jan 1, 2016: Use pain control, in consultation with your veterinarian to mitigate pain associated with dehorning calves after horn bud attachment
Horned Cattle
Proportion of beef cattle with horns has been steadily decreasing
Availability and adoption of polled (hornless) genetics has increased
Most common beef breeds have polled lines available
Eliminates the need for dehorning
Noordsy’s Food Animal Surgery, Wiley Blackwell
Dehorning Take Home Messages Use polled bulls if possible!
Dehorn as young as possible, before horn bud attachment
Lots of dairy calf research showing benefits of combination of local anesthetic + meloxicam
Ideal situation: Sedation + local anesthetic wait 10 minutes… Dehorn and give meloxicam
I use local anesthetic and meloxicam in beef calves and don’t wait long after administration…I still can see obvious differences in behaviour
Branding
Recommended Practices
Brand size must be appropriate to size of animal
Avoid re-branding cattle
Consult your veterinarian for advice on the availability and feasibility of controlling pain associated with branding
Anecdotally, producers using Meloxicam suggest that calves reunite
with dam faster and are easier to move post branding/castration
Take Home Messages for Branding Branding is still a necessary form of ID in some parts of
Canada but is decreasing in prevalence
Research clearly demonstrates pain associated with branding (both hot and cold)
Freeze branding causes less acute pain at the time of the procedure
There is no practical method for local anesthesia available
NSAID’s probably significantly help with post-branding pain
Castration
Requirements
Castration must be performed by competent personnel using proper, clean, well maintained instruments and accepted techniques
Seek guidance from your veterinarian on the optimum method and timing of castration, as well as the availability and advisability of pain control for castrating beef cattle
Castrate calves as young as practically possible
Requirements Effective January 1, 2016
Use pain control, in consultation with your veterinarian, when castrating bulls older than 9 months of age
Effective January 1, 2018
Use pain control, in consultation with your veterinarian, when castrating bulls older than 6 months of age
51% 44%
4%
1% [PERCENTAGE]
Age at Castration: % of all bull calves
< 1 week 1 week-3 months 3-6 months 6-9 months > 9 months
Moggy, Windeyer et al, Western Canadian Cow-calf Surveillance Network
Castration Local anesthesia probably would significantly help, but
difficult to practically administer
Give an epidural injection….wait for 5-10 minutes
a) Xylazine epidurals work really well in older animals
b) Perhaps local anesthetic injected into cord?
c) Some Australian research on topical anesthetic gels
Significant amounts of research on use of NSAIDS with castration
a) Complicated by age, type of castration, drugs used etc.
Castration should be done at as young an age as practically possible!
Castration Take Home Message As young as possible minimizes pain and stress
Local anesthesia is difficult and not easily performed in large herds but probably provides significant benefits in terms of pain control
Promising results for both flunixin and meloxicam (both injectable and oral) as pain control in terms of behavior and biological responses
More studies needed for young beef calves
Where else do we need to consider pain control? Post surgery
Post difficult calving? (cow and calf?)
Lameness and injuries
Other potentially painful conditions?
a) Mastitis
b) Arthritis
Conclusions Pain control is becoming more of a priority within our
industry as part of our animal welfare mandate
Do the simple things first:
a) Use polled bulls if possible
b) If necessary, dehorn before horn bud attachment
c) Local anesthesia is practical for dehorning and easy to learn
d) Castrate at a young age
e) Consider use of NSAID’s for post castration, branding, dehorning pain control
Stay tuned: Major focus of research