Plasma haptoglobin values in cows with different somatic cell counting in milk samples

ABSTRACT

Subclinical mastitis is an important cause of economic losses in dairy cows in Rio Grande do Sul state (southern Brazil) because the deleterious effect on the health of the cow and on the quality of milk. The difficulty of early diagnosis of this problem had led to the study of early indicators of inflammatory conditions, as acute phase proteins, mainly haptoglobin and fibrinogen, in the case of bovines. The aim of this work was to study the relationship between plasma values of haptoglobin (Hp) and fibrinogen in dairy cows with somatic cell counting (SCC) in milk for testing the hypothesis that Hp or fibrinogen would be adequate early indicators of subclinical mastitis.[...]