Practical application of formal epidemiology can be a very useful tool in private practice for food animal veterinarians working in the field of herd health/production medicine. Careful and deliberate determination of the outcome variables of interest in each production situation or application provides a logical starting point for establishing the information requirements necessary to measure the defined outcome variables. Subsequently, the collected data can be used for a wide variety of purposes, including disease investigation, monitoring, forecasting and commercial field trials. The successful application of formal epidemiology in herd health/production medicine can serve as a solid basis for establishing long-term productive business relationships with animal agriculture enterprises.