Good immune status is correlated with the antibody titer of the animals, an optimal level of antibodies will translate into less morbidity and mortality, obtaining better productive and economic parameters.

Vaccination is a widely used methodology with generally good results that improves the protection of birds, however, vaccination failures and the increase in challenges due to high production performance make it convenient to complement vaccination with immunostimulant in order to improve the antibody titer.

Next, a test is presented where immunostimulant pronutrients (IP) were evaluated as enhancers of antibody titers obtained with vaccination in rearing pullets.

Trial: Use of immunostimulant pronutrients in breeder pullets

Objective

Increase vaccine antibody titers in chicks with the use of immunostimulant pronutrients.

Higher antibody titers correlated with better protection against specific diseases.

Experimental design

Number of animals: 42,000 breeders in the rearing phase (pullets).

Vaccination: all pullets were vaccinated at week 15 of age against infectious bronchitis (IBV), Gumboro disease (IBD) and Newcastle disease (NDV).

Treatment groups: 14,000 birds per group.

• T1 (IP): chicks receiving immunostimulant pronutrients at 0.5 ml/l in drinking water at week 15:
• 1Administration began 5 days before and lasted up to 5 days after vaccination, making a total of 10 days
• T2: they do not receive any immunostimulant
• T3: they do not receive any immunostimulant

Analysis: blood samples were taken at week 33 to 10 animals per group to evaluate the antibody titers.

Results

Blood tests of 10 birds per batch were analyzed to find out the antibody titers obtained with the vaccines. The group that received immunostimulant pronutrients (T1) showed higher titers for all the antibodies evaluated, compared to the untreated groups (T2, T3).

As a percentage, T1 (IP) compared to T2 obtained increased antibody titers as follows:

• Infectious bronchitis: 45%↑
• Gumboro disease: 43,46% ↑
• Newcastle disease: 23,49% ↑

Compared with T3, T1 increased antibody titers by:

• Infectious bronchitis: 22,41% ↑
• Gumboro disease: 78,95% ↑
• Newcastle disease: 40,45% ↑

Conclusions

The trial proved that immunostimulant pronutrients are effective to increase the antibody titers obtained with vaccinations. The average increase for each vaccine was:

• +33,8% for infectious bronchitis
• +61,2% for Gumboro disease
• +32,0% for Newcastle disease

This indicates that immunostimulant pronutrients increase vaccination efficacy and protection against infectious bronchitis and Gumboro and Newcastle diseases.

Immunostimulant pronutrients are a technology developed and marketed by Biovet S.A under the name Alquernat Immuplus, available in premix and liquid presentation.