Evaluation of reproductive performance after implementation of Fostera~R PRRS in a 9,000 sow production system using continuous quality improvement tools

摘要

Porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome (PRRS) causes significant negative financial impact in breeding herds. An acute outbreak can be very dramatic and costly having an estimated cost of $255 per sow and once PRRS virus is circulating in sowspopulation as an endemic pathogen has an ongoing diminished reproductive performance.1 The estimated cost of PRRS in a sow farm chronically infected is $74.16 per litter, this cost is calculated in loss of performance in reproductive parameters like farrowing rate, liveborn/litter and pre-wean mortality using margin-over-variable-cost (MOVC) method.1 PRRS vaccination with Modified Live Vaccines is considered a preventive intervention to minimize PRRS-associated losses when pig populations become infected with Wild-Type PRRS virus (WT-PRRSv) and it helps to build PRRS herd immunity to achieve stability sooner and minimize production losses compared to farms without previous PRRS herd immunity.2 Quality and process improvement is defined as a reduction of variability in processes and it uses statistical techniques like Statistical Process Control (SPC) and Capability Analysis.3 A Control Chart is an enhanced time series plot designed to identify special patterns of variability in data called signals, and process capability is a statistical measure of inherent variation for a given characteristic in a stable process, in other words, it's the measure of the ability of a process to produce outputs that meet the specifications.4 The objective of this project was to use quality improvement tools like Statistical Process Control charts and Capability Analysis as practical and reliable tools to evaluate PRRS control interventions implemented in a 9,000 sow production system.