A disease monitoring system for dairy herds.

A system for recording and evaluating disease, intended for both dairy herd health monitoring and research purposes, is described. The system was initiated in 1960 with the objective of providing a research database and it has been developed to respond to the herd health management needs of modern farmers and veterinarians. The system is probably one of the oldest disease recording systems in existence and has contributed to the expansion of epidemiological knowledge of dairy cattle diseases and has helped to improve the health management of dairy herds. The history of the system, the herd reporting form and various analyses and reports generated with the system are presented.