Abstract #29

# 29
The development of a decision support tool to determine optimal economic treatment decisions by causative mastitis pathogen.
D. T. Nolan*1, J. M. Bewley1, 1University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY.

Mastitis is a complex disease, caused by a variety of pathogens that affect the cow in different ways. The complexity of mastitis makes treatment decisions and cost estimates difficult to make. A decision support tool was developed allowing dairy producers to calculate the cost of a case of mastitis when making optimum treatment decisions based on infecting pathogen using herd data. Mastitis costs were modeled using a stochastic decision tree (Palisade Corporation, Ithaca, NY) that represents decisions and probabilities that producers face with a mastitis case. A stochastic decision tree allowed researchers to model the cost of mastitis treatments while changing market, production, and pathogen characteristic values by running multiple model iterations. A dashboard (SAP SE, Weinheim, Germany) was developed, allowing for producer interaction with the model. The dashboard presents treatment options for a case of mastitis including a 2-, 5-, and 8-d intramammary treatment, no treatment, or culling and allows dairy producers to choose a treatment option and infecting pathogen. To demonstrate how the model works, baseline values were set using averages obtained from an Dairy Records Management Systems (Dairy Records Management Systems, Raleigh, NC) data. Dairy producers can change inputs to make production values herd specific. The following is an example dashboard output using the base model for a second lactation cow with a Staph aureus infection. If the producer selected a 2-d treatment, the mastitis case cost was $388.18. The 2-d intramammary treatment would be economically optimal in 100% of iterations compared with both a 5- and 8-d treatment regimen. However, the 2-d treatment was economically optimal for 13% and 0% of iterations with culling or no treatment as the treatment option, respectively. Making the optimum treatment decision when faced with a mastitis case is complicated. The University of Kentucky Southeast Quality Milk Initiative Mastitis Treatment Dashboard (https://afs.ca.uky.edu/dairy/decisiontools/mastitistreatment) aids producers in comparing treatment options using real farm data.

Key Words: mastitis, economics, decision support