Digital dermatitis is endemic in the cattle herds of Wisconsin. Dr. Dörte Döpfer, DVM, MSc, PhD, an epidemiologist at the UW School of Veterinary Food Animal Production Medicine, encourages farmers to keep the long term management in mind as they struggle to improve claw health in their cows.

Döpfer, together with Food Animal Production Medicine, farmers and hoof trimmers, is working to combat digital dermatitis, a painful and highly contagious multifactorial infection spreading rapidly across the country. Under a three-year USDA Animal Health grant that began in October of 2009, Döpfer is applying field research and the assistance of local farmers to root out risk factors associated with the infection, as well as effective methods for maintaining claw health.

Digital dermatitis, referred to as “hairy heel warts”  by farmers, is a problem that emerged during the early nineties. It was first identified in Italy in the 1970s, spreading quickly across Europe before finally emerging in the US. The disease causes painful ulcers on the foot that spread quickly to the other cows in the herd. “Treating one of the ulcers is not a problem,” Dopfer said. “The problem is that they come back in outbreaks.”

With such a wide spread disease like this, Döpfer and her team are looking beyond the individual and into the environment, the herd, and the issue of long-term health management. Döpfer explains that, while treponema-like spirochetes are the bacteria mainly held responsible for the ulcers, other influences come into play as well. “The cause is multi-factorial, with a strong bacteriological component,” said Döpfer. “If you control the risk factors—animal density, pen hygiene, and optimal hoofbathing—you can keep it at a manageable level.”

The concept of best practice management—the idea of not only seeking a cure, but looking for a way to manage the problem as a whole through the practices of the farm—has led Döpfer and her team to find encouraging results using hoof baths. In this process, the entire herd walks through shallow baths filled 4-5 inches deep with a sanitizing solution of for example copper sulfate. By combining this strategy with careful herd records and the use of local therapy of individual ulcers when outbreaks occur, Döpfer is confident that farmers are seeing good results.

“There is no magic bullet to eliminating digital dermatitis, we are looking into the long-term effects of claw health management,” Döpfer said. “We want to achieve a manageable state of disease.” Although the problem is rampant, Döpfer’s team is pleased with their progress, thanks in large part to the farmers and hoof trimmers in the area who have helped collect samples and try out new management strategies. With a long-term goal in mind, farmers should be able to cope with digital dermatitis within their herds, and all herds across the country..