A team of Iowa State veterinarians is leading a national project to develop an Internet database for the treatment of livestock. The Web-based database aims to help veterinarians appropriately use antimicrobial drugs to treat swine and cattle.

Mike Apley, assistant professor of veterinary diagnostic and production animal science, said there are concerns about antimicrobial drugs becoming less effective because of inappropriate use in treating livestock.

“Veterinarians and food animal producers are under increasing pressure to justify the use of antimicrobials,” he said.

Virginia Fajt, adjunct professor of veterinary diagnostic and production animal science, said antimicrobial drugs are used to treat bacterial diseases.

The team of veterinarians hope a database of treatment suggestions will help veterinarians use antimicrobial drugs more effectively.

“A Web site is really the only way to get the most information in one area,” Fajt said.

The project will help give food-animal practitioners all the available information and scientific justification to support the course of treatment they decide to follow, Apley said.

Veterinarians sometimes have to resort to what is called “extra label use.” This is when drugs are not labeled for a particular situation, Apley said.

“They have to pick a drug that is not approved for that use but which their experience tells them will work,” he said.

Apley said he gets 160 to 250 calls every year from veterinarians who have encountered this type of problem.

The Web-based database will provide easy access to clinical data so veterinarians can find the most appropriate treatment regiment.

The database will give information on dose, route of administration and frequency of dose, Fajt said.

Another advantage of the project is that it assesses how much knowledge is missing from the field.

“It’s going to highlight holes in our knowledge,” Apley said.

Fajt received a $15,000 fellowship from U.S. Pharmacopoeia for the project.

This is the first time the USP has funded veterinary research with a fellowship.

“[The fellowship] will allow me to talk with veterinary practitioners and show them what we are working on,” Fajt said.

This will allow her to get suggestions on how to best set up the database.

“We are starting to assemble our first set of data,” she said. “We are rounding up all the available information and boiling it down to what the veterinary needs to know.”

The team is also working on a trial run of the database for neo-natal diarrhea in calves.

“We’re starting out with cattle and swine, and we hope eventually it could expand to all veterinary species,” Apley said.

The team is now scouring the peer-reviewed literature to decide what to include in the database.

“We are doing extensive searches of the scientific literature,” Fajt said.

The project will be funded for three years, Apley said.

“We’ve put together $189,000 [for three years] from five contributing organizations,” he said.

These groups include National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, American Association of Swine Practitioners, American Association of Bovine Practitioners, American Veterinary Medical Association, and the U.S. Pharmacopoeia.