Use of Rapid Culture Systems to Guide Clinical Mastitis Treatment Decisions.

The selective treatment of clinical mastitis based on culture results can reduce antibiotic use by more than 50% without sacrificing treatment efficacy. Local laboratories reporting results in a 24-hour period, or adoption of on-farm milk culture systems, allow producers to make strategic treatment decisions. On-farm culture systems are most reliable when used to classify infections in broad diagnostic categories such as no growth, gram-positive, or gram-negative growth. Diagnostic accuracy is crucial for on-farm culture systems to be efficacious and economically advantageous. Quality assurance is necessary for the success of on-farm culture systems.