Development and use of Biocheck.UGent™ scoring system to quantify biosecurity in conventional indoor (turkey, duck, breeder) and free-range (layer and broiler) poultry farms

Amalraj, Arthi; Van Meirhaeghe, Hilde; Caekebeke, Nele; Creve, Rhea; Dufay-Lefort, Anne-Christine; Rousset, Nathalie; Spaans, Annick; Devesa, Aitor; Tilli, Giuditta; Piccirillo, Alessandra; Żbikowski, Artur; Kovács, László; Chantziaras, Ilias; Dewulf, Jeroen

doi:10.1016/j.prevetmed.2024.106288

Preventive Veterinary Medicine

2024

DOI: 10.1016/j.prevetmed.2024.106288

|View full text |Cite

Development and use of Biocheck.UGent™ scoring system to quantify biosecurity in conventional indoor (turkey, duck, breeder) and free-range (layer and broiler) poultry farms

Arthi Amalraj,

Hilde Van Meirhaeghe,

Nele Caekebeke

et al.

Help me understand this report

Search citation statements

Order By: Relevance

Paper Sections

Select...

Citation Types

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Year Published

2024

2025

Publication Types

Select...

Article3

Relationship

Self Cite0

Independent3

Authors

Journals

Cited by 3 publications

References 43 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

The correlation between on-farm biosecurity and animal welfare indices in large-scale turkey production

Kovács,

Klaucke,

Farkas

et al. 2025

Poultry Science

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The correlation between on-farm biosecurity and animal welfare indices in large-scale turkey production

Kovács,

Klaucke,

Farkas

et al. 2025

Poultry Science

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Use of conjoint analysis to weight biosecurity practices on pasture-based dairy farms to develop a novel audit tool—BioscoreDairy

O Donovan,

McAloon,

O'Grady

et al. 2024

Front. Vet. Sci.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Risk assessments are important tools to identify deficits in biosecurity management practices. A major strength of some existing tools is that they facilitate cross-country comparisons. However, a weakness is their failure to account for unique intra-national farming enterprise structures such as, for example, pasture-based dairying. Currently, there are no suitable biosecurity risk assessment tools applicable to pasture-based dairying as practiced in Ireland. In addition to a need for enterprise-specific biosecurity risk assessment tools, the weighting of risk scores generated by these tools needs to be context-specific to ensure validity in assessing biosecurity risks in the farming sector of interest. Furthermore, existing biosecurity audits rely exclusively on respondent recall to answer questions about management practices. To address each of these limitations of existing biosecurity risk assessment tools we developed and optimised a new biosecurity risk assessment tool (BioscoreDairy) designed to assess the biosecurity status of pasture-based dairy farms in Ireland. It consists of two parts, a biosecurity questionnaire and a cattle movement records audit. A questionnaire was developed on biosecurity management practices appropriate for a pasture-based dairy system. Multiple national expert groups were leveraged to provide weightings for the different management practices in the questionnaire using the best-worst scaling methodology of MaxDiff. The results of this process provided a numerical categorisation that could then be used to assign scores to the individual biosecurity management practices. These practices were grouped into three biosecurity areas; risk of disease entry, speed of disease spread and diagnosis of infection. Within each of these three areas, a traffic light system was used to compare a farm’s biosecurity risks to other similar farms—least risk (green; within the top third of farms), concerning practice (amber; middle third) and worst practice or greatest risk (red; lowest third). In addition to these scores, the cattle introduction profile of a herd over the previous 3 years, based on nationally recorded data, was audited, compared amongst dairy farm enterprise subtypes, and included in the BioscoreDairy report. BioscoreDairy is therefore the first biosecurity risk assessment tool tailored to pasture-based dairy farm systems, both for individual farm reporting and for benchmarking against comparable farms.

show abstract

Assessing the Impact of On-Farm Biosecurity Coaching on Farmer Perception and Farm Biosecurity Status in Belgian Poultry Production

Amalraj,

Van Meirhaeghe,

Chantziaras

et al. 2024

Animals

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Veterinary coaching was tested to assess its efficacy in promoting adherence to biosecurity procedures. Poultry farmers (n = 13) in Belgium were profiled using ADKAR®, coached and audited prior to and 6 months after coaching. The ADKAR® (Awareness, Desire, Knowledge, Ability, and Reinforcement) profiling technique identified 5/13 participating farmers with relatively low scores (≤3) for one or more elements that block change (biosecurity compliance in this case). Education was the only demographic variable that influenced knowledge scores. Through the Biocheck.UgentTM methodology, farm biosecurity was assessed and benchmarked to allow for tailored guidance. The farmer, farm veterinarian, and coach defined a farm-specific action plan that covered infrastructure, site access, staff/visitors, purchase policies, transport and depopulation, feed and water supplies, flock management, cleaning and disinfection between flocks, and measures between houses. From a total of 49 proposed actions, 36 were adopted. Purchasing policy had the highest (100%) and cleaning and disinfection had the lowest compliance (38%). Time, cost, and feasibility (e.g., inadequate farm layout) were the main reasons cited for not implementing action points. Overall, biosecurity improved significantly (p = 0.002) from 67.1 ± 5.7% to 70.3 ± 5.7% (mean ± Std. dev). The study, hence, presents convincing proof of how coaching can lead to new solutions not previously considered.

show abstract

scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.

Contact Info

customersupport@researchsolutions.com

10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614

Henderson, NV 89052, USA

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Blog Terms and Conditions API Terms Privacy Policy Contact Cookie Preferences Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information

Made with 💙 for researchers

Part of the Research Solutions Family.

Development and use of Biocheck.UGent™ scoring system to quantify biosecurity in conventional indoor (turkey, duck, breeder) and free-range (layer and broiler) poultry farms

Cited by 3 publications

References 43 publications

The correlation between on-farm biosecurity and animal welfare indices in large-scale turkey production

The correlation between on-farm biosecurity and animal welfare indices in large-scale turkey production

Use of conjoint analysis to weight biosecurity practices on pasture-based dairy farms to develop a novel audit tool—BioscoreDairy

Assessing the Impact of On-Farm Biosecurity Coaching on Farmer Perception and Farm Biosecurity Status in Belgian Poultry Production

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About