The polymerase chain reaction (PCR) has been widely used for diagnosis of infectious diseases of domestic animals. Rapid detection of respiratory pathogens of cattle is useful for making therapeutic decisions. Therefore, we developed a new genetic-based method called droplet-real-time PCR, which can detect bovine respiratory syncytial virus (BRSV) within 10 min. Our droplet-real-time PCR markedly reduced the reaction time of reverse transcription-PCR while maintaining the same sensitivity as conventional real-time PCR, and it can be used as a rapid assay for detection of BRSV. Furthermore, our method is potentially applicable for rapid diagnosis of almost all infectious diseases, including highly pathogenic avian influenza virus.