Worming treatment check service
Techion’s UK FECPAKG2 laboratory is approved by DEFRA and accredited by VETQAS® (APHA's independent, accredited, proficiency testing service) to undertake Faecal Egg Count (FEC) testing for the Worming Treatment Check (WTC) initiative under the Animal Health and Welfare Pathway.
Animal health and welfare pathway
This pathway offers financial support to farmers who take actions to directly improve the health and welfare of their animals; including a Vet visit and two composite Faecal Egg Counts (FEC), pre- and post-treatment.
(Please note all sampling and worming is to be carried out by the farmer)
What's included in Techion's FECPAKG2 WTC service?
There's a lot more to it than a simple FEC monitoring test
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Two FEC Tests – one Pre-Treatment and one Post-Treatment, conducted using the sensitive FECPAKG2 5 epg test (see information below).
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It is expected that FEC monitoring would have been conducted by the vet prior to starting this process to ensure FEC levels are high enough to start (ideally >500 epg strongyles or >300 epg if infected with Nematodirus).
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15 individual samples are required, and these will be pooled at the lab to make a composite sample.
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After preparing the composite sample, a minimum of 2 sub-samples will be FEC-tested as required by the WTC.
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Should a low FEC be observed, the test sample will continue to be read until a minimum of 200 eggs are counted. This conforms to the published guidelines set out by the World Association for the Advancement of Veterinary Parasitology (WAAVP, 2022) Combatting Anthelmintic Resistance in Ruminants (COMBAR, 2021) groups - this approach provides added statistical robustness when comparing FEC tests.
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A sampling pack including all the sampling bags required, submission forms and suitable packaging and labelling for postage back to Techion’s laboratory.
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Full postage costs.
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Submission forms include a short survey as recommended for the Animal Health & Welfare Pathway.
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A detailed report conforms to the WTC steering group recommendations.
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We give clear guidance and support on how to carry out the tests.
FECPAKG2 5 EPG test
The FECPAKG2 5 epg Test has been developed for the Faecal Egg Count Reduction Test (FECRT) and our PhenR service which is validated with a sensitivity of 5 epg .
In comparison, the standard FECPAKG2 detection sensitivity is 35 epg (each egg observed is multiplied by 35) and standard McMasters method has a sensitivity of 50 epg.
Although the WTC isn’t as detailed as a full FECRT, using this more sensitive 5 epg test method, as well as following the COMBAR guidelines of counting a minimum of 200 raw eggs in the Pre-Treatment FEC test, will bring added robustness to the results.
FECPAKG2 WTC pricing
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Full Worming Treatment Check service
- £80 + VAT
- For one anthelmintic group
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Part test - where pre-treatment FEC is too low
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£50 + VAT
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There will be a requirement for pre-treatment test FEC levels to be above 200 epg for strongyles.
OPTIONAL
Additional Wormer Groups can be tested at same time: £20 per group
- Additional tests are not funded under the Pathway WTC scheme.
- Farmers can split lambs in a group to treat with different wormers if they choose.
- Separate post-treatment samples must be submitted for each group and compared to the same Pre-Treatment result from the larger group.