Dissection with target-oriented organ removal in pigs - what for?

The post-mortem opening and pathomorphological examination of the carcass is a valuable addition to clinical diagnostic methods.

While the clinical examination of the living animal must in principle be limited to a check of the organ functions and a narrow spectrum of sample materials that can be taken from the animal, such as blood, excretions and secretions, the pathological examination of dead and killed animals allows the optimum samples for clarifying the cause of the disease and death to be taken specifically from a very broad spectrum of possible samples and examined further.

The pathomorphological findings can provide additional information that can often narrow down the aetiological differential diagnoses of the clinical examination to a few. These can then be specifically clarified by further examinations.

In addition, indirect and direct evidence of pathogens that occur naturally or frequently in pigs, such as PCV2, Actinobacillus pleuropneumoniae, Glaesserella parasuis or Mycoplasma, can often only be weighted in terms of their case-related clinicopathological significance through the detection or exclusion of pathogen-typical lesions.