Background: Concentration of anti-Müllerian hormone (AMH) has been found lower in cows with ovarian failure and inferior fertility. However, little information is available on whether or not a cutoff concentration of AMH could be used as a marker to differentiate cows with ovarian failure from cows with healthy ovaries or to predict the potential fertility of cows.
Objectives: Accordingly, the present study was conducted to understand if AMH could serve as a diagnostic marker for ovarian failure or a predictive marker for reproductive success in primiparous cows, which has the largest population in dairy herds.
Methods: For this purpose, a dataset of AMH concentration belonging to 608 cows (23 cows were diagnosed with ovarian failure and 585 cows were diagnosed with cyclic ovaries) was used for the analyses concerning the first objective of this study. Furthermore, 568 cows out of these 608 cows had data of first service conception risk, which were used for analyses concerning the second objective of this study. Out of these 568 cows, 313 and 255 cows were diagnosed pregnant and nonpregnant after the first service postpartum, respectively. To assess the capability of AMH to be a marker for diagnosis of ovarian failure and prediction of reproductive success in the first service postpartum, receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis was used.
Results: AMH concentration was lower in cows diagnosed with ovarian failure than cows with cyclic ovaries (P<0.0001), and a decision threshold of 324.57pg/ml was identified as optimal cutoff by ROC curve analysis. At or below this cutoff, the test yielded a sensitivity of 100.00% and a specificity of 89.74%. Furthermore, AMH concentration was higher in cows diagnosed pregnant than cows diagnosed nonpregnant after the first service postpartum (P<0.01), and a decision threshold of 439.93pg/ml was identified as optimal cutoff by ROC curve analysis. At or above this cutoff, the test yielded a sensitivity of 68.24% and a specificity of 60.06%.
Conclusion: In conclusion, the present study showed that AMH could be a proper rule-out biomarker for ovarian failure in primiparous dairy cows. However, AMH concentration lacked sufficient predictive ability for conception outcomes in primiparous cows.