Correlation of salmonella spp. In pigs at slaugther as determined by bacterial culture and salmonella ELISA
Date
Authors
Major Professor
Advisor
Committee Member
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Altmetrics
Abstract
The purpose of this study was to detennine the prevalence of Salmonella spp. in pigs at slaughter by bacterial culture, and serology using the Danish Mix-ELISA. Fecal samples and mesenteric lymph nodes were collected from 20 farms (30-35 samples per farm) and cultured for Salmonella on XLD agar following a pre-enrichment in buffered peptone water at 37° C for 24 hours and enrichment in Rappaport-Vassiliadis broth at 42° C for 24 hours. Eighteen of 20 farms yielded at least one positive sample by culture with farm sample prevalence ranging from 3.3% to 96.6%. There were 16 different serotypes of Salmonella isolated. Individual farms had from 0 - 6 different serotypes detected by bacteriologic examination. The Danish Mix-ELISA, developed by Nielsen et al. and currently used in the Danish slaughter plants, was used to test sera collected at slaughter. Using the Mix-ELISA, 16/20 farms were positive with farm sample prevalence ranging from 28.6% to 100%. In comparing the farms, there was a direct correlation between lymph node culture and MixELISA detection levels. These data suggest that the Mix-ELISA may be a valuable herd screening tool for the evaluation of Salmonella levels in U.S. swine herds. Also, these data suggest that vaccination of pigs with SC-54 significantly reduces the prevalence of Salmonella when measured by serology, mesenteric lymph node culture, and fecal culture.