Welfare, pain relief and productivity

Pain management plays a critical role in animal welfare. Freedom from pain, injury and disease is one of the core animal welfare principles established by the Five Freedoms framework defined in 1965. In fact, chronic pain, and to a lesser extent acute pain, results in poor welfare of production animals¹.

Consequences of pain in cattle: poor welfare and decreased productivity levels

Pain affects cattle behaviour and alters their activity patterns², while also impacting their general health. Pain in cattle leads to production losses (milk yield, growth rates) and reduced reproductive performance^3,4, directly impacting farmers’ income and well-being. Growing societal concerns about animal welfare creates additional pressure on the agricultural industry to produce food in a more ethical and sustainable way, making pain management in cattle more important than ever.

Despite the increased recognition of pain in cattle, there are still many situations in which pain is not mitigated by the implementation of adequate pain management protocols.

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Role of pain management in sustainable dairy and beef production.

As custodians of animal welfare, vets have a critical role to play to ensure cattle welfare and implement pain management protocols, in partnership with farmers.

How to mitigate cattle pain on farms? The constant dilemma between welfare, cost and productivity

Assessing pain in cattle: a challenging task for vets and farmers

Pain assessment is the essential first step. Behavioural changes and variations in physiological responses can be signs of pain in cattle⁷. Behavioural changes may include alterations in cattle’s spontaneous behaviour in their living area^8,9, response to palpation of painful areas⁹, hoof-lifting, and absence of feeding and ruminating¹⁰. Both increased and/or reduced daily lying time can be signs of pain in cattle, making the task of properly recognising pain in cattle even more challenging⁶.

Table 1: Signs associated with pain level in cattle

Recognising and assessing signs of pain in cattle can be challenging and inconsistent, both for veterinarians and farmers^_6,7. Although pain is often recognised in some conditions and procedures, pain management is inconsistently applied on farms.

Difficulties in properly and objectively assessing pain in cattle can lead to inconsistencies in methods of relieving animals from pain^5,7. Assessing the level of pain can be subject to large differences in individual perceptions of pain in cattle; veterinarians who do not routinely use analgesics tend to assign lower pain scores to cattle⁷. Interestingly, recent research suggests there is no correlation between pain and empathy scores when veterinarians and farmers assess pain in cows, and empathy is not associated with the use of NSAIDs¹².

Figure 1: Perception of pain by farmer and veterinarian

Veterinarians tend to perceive the cost of NSAID treatment more of a barrier than farmers, suggesting that NSAIDs could be more readily offered¹². Most farmers obtain their knowledge of pain recognition and treatment from their personal experience (61%). Most veterinarians tend to use both their personal experience and continuing education to identify and mitigate pain in cattle⁵.

As attitudes and approaches towards pain scores and pain management in farm animals vary from person to person, pain perception can be affected, and so can be the subsequent use of analgesics.

According to research, there are opportunities for veterinarians to engage more with farmers on pain management in cattle, suggesting the critical role of veterinarians in improving cattle welfare⁵.

Educating dairy farmers on the benefits of analgesia, especially for conditions and procedures where NSAIDs use is low compared to pain scores (for instance Burdizzo castration in calves, white line separation and abscesses, mastitis with clots in milk, calving with no assistance), could be beneficial to further improve pain management and cattle welfare on farms¹².

This could also have an impact on the profitability of farms and the well-being of farmers, as pain mitigation would enable better productivity and therefore better production outcomes.

Figure 2: Pain scores vs NSAIDs use

References

^1.Windsor PA. Role of Topical Anaesthesia in Pain Management of Farm Animals, a Changing Paradigm. Animals (Basel). 2022 Sep 17;12(18):2459. doi: 10.3390/ ani12182459. PMID: 36139319; PMCID: PMC9495143.

^2. Zoltick, Abigale & Mann, Sabine & Coetzee, Johann. 2024. Pain pathophysiology and pharmacology of cattle: how improved understanding can enhance pain prevention, mitigation, and welfare. Frontiers in Pain Research. 5. 10.3389/ fpain.2024.1396992.

^3. Petersson-Wolfe CS, Leslie KE, Swartz TH. An Update on the Effect of Clinical Mastitis on the Welfare of Dairy Cows and Potential Therapies. Vet Clin North Am Food Anim Pract. 2018 Nov;34(3):525-535. doi: 10.1016/j.cvfa.2018.07.006. PMID: 30316508.

^4.Steagall PV, Bustamante H, Johnson CB, Turner PV. Pain Management in Farm Animals: Focus on Cattle, Sheep and Pigs. Animals (Basel). 2021 May 21;11(6):1483. doi: 10.3390/ani11061483. PMID: 34063847; PMCID: PMC8223984.

^5. Windsor PA. Role of Topical Anaesthesia in Pain Management of Farm Animals, a Changing Paradigm. Animals (Basel). 2022 Sep 17;12(18):2459. doi: 10.3390/ ani12182459. PMID: 36139319; PMCID: PMC9495143.

^6. Mainau E, Llonch P, Temple D, Goby L, Manteca X. Alteration in Activity Patterns of Cows as a Result of Pain Due to Health Conditions. Animals (Basel). 2022 Jan 12;12(2):176. doi: 10.3390/ani12020176. PMID: 35049798; PMCID: PMC8773241.

^7. Huxley JN, Whay HR. Current attitudes of cattle practitioners to pain and the use of analgesics in cattle. Vet Rec. 2006 Nov 11;159(20):662-8. doi: 10.1136/ vr.159.20.662. PMID: 17099174.

^8. Prunier A, Mounier L, Le Neindre P, Leterrier C, Mormède P, Paulmier V, Prunet P, Terlouw C, Guatteo R. Identifying and monitoring pain in farm animals: a review. Animal. 2013 Jun;7(6):998-1010. doi: 10.1017/S1751731112002406. Epub 2012 Dec 20. PMID: 23254122.

^9.Ginger L, Ledoux D, Bouchon M, Rautenbach I, Bagnard C, Lurier T, Foucras G, Germon P, Durand D, de Boyer des Roches A. Using behavioral observations in freestalls and at milking to improve pain detection in dairy cows after lipopolysaccharideinduced clinical mastitis. J Dairy Sci. 2023 Aug;106(8):5606-5625. doi: 10.3168/ jds.2022-22533. Epub 2023 Jun 1. PMID: 37268578.

^10. Leslie KE, Petersson-Wolfe CS. Assessment and management of pain in dairy cows with clinical mastitis. Vet Clin North Am Food Anim Pract. 2012 Jul;28(2):289-305. doi: 10.1016/j.cvfa.2012.04.002. PMID: 22664209.

^11. Calf Welfare. Care4dairy. 2024. https://care4dairy.eu/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/ Calf_Welfare-2.pdf . Accessed February 25th 2025.

^12. Browne, Natasha & Conneely, Muireann & Hudson, Chris. 2022. Use of Non-Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs and Attitudes to Pain in Pasture-Based Dairy Cows: A Comparative Study of Farmers and Veterinarians. Frontiers in Veterinary Science. 9. 10.3389/fvets.2022.912564.

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