The Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) cow
mastitis causes great losses to the cow industry. In order to improve the treatment effect of
tilmicosin against cow
mastitis, the combination of solid
lipid nanoparticle (SLN) technology with
in situ hydrogel technology was used to prepare the self-assembly
tilmicosin nanogel (TIL-
nanogel). The physicochemical characteristics, in vitro release, antibacterial activity and in vivo treatment efficacy of TIL-SLNs and TIL-
nanogel were studied, respectively. The results showed the loading capacity (LC), encapsulation efficiency (EE), size, zeta potential and poly dispersion index (PDI) of TIL-
nanogel were 23.33 ± 0.77%, 67.89 ± 3.01%, 431.57 ± 12.87 nm, 8.3 ± 0.06 mv and, 0.424 ± 0.032, respectively. The TIL-
nanogel showed stronger sustained release in vitro than TIL-SLNs and commercial injection. The cure rate of half dosage and normal dosage of TIL-
nanogel was 58.3% and 75.0%, which was higher than that of commercial injection (50.0%) at normal dosage. The results suggest that the treatment dosage of
tilmicosin for cow
mastitis could be reduced by TIL-
nanogel. The novel TIL-
nanogel will be beneficial by decreasing the usage of
tilmicosin and the treatment costs of cow
mastitis.