AI-based prediction and detection of early-onset of digital dermatitis in dairy cows using infrared thermography

Digital dermatitis (DD) is a common foot disease that can cause lameness, decreased milk production and fertility decline in cows. The prediction and early detection of DD can positively impact animal welfare and profitability of the dairy industry. This study applies deep learning-based computer vision techniques for early onset detection and prediction of DD using infrared thermography (IRT) data. We investigated the role of various inputs for these tasks, including thermal images of cow feet, statistical color features extracted from IRT images, and manually registered temperature values. Our models achieved performances of above 81% accuracy on DD detection on 'day 0' (first appearance of clinical signs), and above 70% accuracy prediction of DD two days prior to the first appearance of clinical signs. Moreover, current findings indicate that the use of IRT images in conjunction with AI based predictors show real potential for developing future real-time automated tools to monitoring DD in dairy cows.