Electrophysiologic Evidence of Loss of Consciousness in Cattle During Slaughter

A systematic review synthesizing neurophysiologic evidence on the time to loss of consciousness in cattle during slaughter with and without stunning. The document, authored by Sheryl R. Haut, includes a methodological overview and analysis of nine studies identified through a PRISMA-guided search of databases through December 2025. It reports electrophysiologic markers consistent with loss of consciousness occurring between 4.4 and 13 seconds after incision.

Use Cases

• Informing animal welfare policy and religious slaughter regulations based on synthesized electrophysiologic evidence.
• Methodological guidance for future electrophysiology studies on loss of consciousness in livestock based on the review's critical discussion.
• Comparative analysis of slaughter methods (with vs. without stunning) based on reported time-to-LOC data from included studies.

Strengths

• Follows a PRISMA-guided systematic review methodology, enhancing reproducibility.
• Assesses risk of bias across included studies using the ROBINS-I tool.
• Focuses on the highest-quality available electrophysiologic data from nine included studies.

Limitations

• The dataset is a 14.6 KB DOCX document, indicating a very limited textual scope rather than a primary data collection.
• Row count and column-level data are unknown; the document is a review article, not a structured dataset.
• Reported times to loss of consciousness vary across studies, with noted methodological differences and limitations.

Provenance

Source

figshare

Collection Method

Systematic literature review using PubMed/MEDLINE, Web of Science, Cochrane Library, and Google Scholar.

Time Range

Literature search conducted through December 2025.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-05-18 16:02:07.