Genetic defects in puppy - Page 4

Something wrong with PDB--messages submitted without my clicking: The German Shepherd Dog: A Genetic History: "Atopic Disease Hypersensivity to pollens, other inhaled particles and to a series of other influences is known in the dog. Allergies of this kind are frequently called atopic disease. There is involvement of the antibody IgE and there are strong hereditary tendencies. In a study of 1809 canine patients at the University of Pennsylvania some 3.31% were diagnosed as having atopic disease (Halliwell and Schwartzman, 1971). In this study breed incidence was compared with incidence among 14,379 patients over a 2-year period. The Wire Fox Terrier accounted for 15% of atopic cases but only 1.1% of the clinical population. This suggested a predisposition to atopic disease in the breed. Other breeds were also involved, but the GSD seemed to be at below average risk. The breed comprised 15.5% of the clinical population but only 3.3% of atopic disease cases. The condition seemed commoner in females than males. A more recent Norwegian study (Vollset, 1985) implicate the WHWT but did not seem to involve the GSD at exceptional levels."

Oh, I don't mind revealing Dylan's pedigree. His sire is on the database, Quai v Sternbusch, his dam American lines - Doppelt Tay, Darby-Dan (his breeder), Stuttgard, Kratochvil, Zarzal, Shiloh Garden.

Interesting. The only two GSDs I have known to have lupus were from dogs related to Sirrocco if memory serves me right - heavily Shiloh Gardens.

I live in Phoenix, bright and sunny all year. Yes, the first thing I suspected was some type of scrape or injury, but we have restricted his activity and kept him within sight for several weeks with no improvement. He was given the normal course of DHPP vacs and rabies at 16 weeks as required by law. He was also given intra nasal bordatella at 16 weeks, required to begin group training. The pigment loss is confined to the top of nose where the fur begins and is accompanied by some slight scaling and dryness. As it was explained to me, tacrolimus provides the same results as a steroid without the side effects. It acts by suppressing the immune response that is causing the cell damage and pigment loss associated with discoid lupus. The vet and my own research indicates that the disease is actually an overactive immune system response which attacks healthy cells beginning with the pigment. It is triggered or accelerated with sun exposure which definately increased as he got older and more active. He is from German show lines, sire is Fabian vom Mittelwest, dam is Genna vom Mittelwest. I find it odd given the large amount of progeny from the sire that this issue has not been spotted before.

For some reason I thought you lived in Maryland. Years ago I participated in a lupus clinic sponsored by a local Sheltie club in conjunction with Tufts University. Their dogs had a high incidence of SLE and a few had discoid. Tufts was interested in some blood samples from effected and uneffect related dogs. The SLE dogs had to have been confirmed by an antibody test and they accepted the dogs with discoid based on clinical evaluation and we did some punch biopsies on a few of them. We drew blood from more than 100 of those little critters that day. Tufts eventually concluded that there was a genetic component to the systemic, a simple recessive if I remember correctly, but I don't think they ever did find any conclusive evidence of the mode for the discoid although they did feel it was also genetic in that breed. BTW, with treatment, the dogs with discoid often cleared to the point that the lesions on their noses were barely visible. It was rare to have to get out the big guns for discoid, panalog and sunscreen seems to do the job. As I recall the biggest issue the Sheltie breeders had was with the dogs that scabbed up on their ear tips. They had problems manipulating those ears to retain the desirable 1/3 tip LOL. Adhesive and lead powder didn't mix all that well with the panalog LOL. Yes, lupus is the result of the body's attacking itself - a dog with SLE is, simple put, allergic to him or herself so steroids are the drugs of choice.

Catching up here. Thanks TIG, I didn't know about that study involving the guide dogs in England. I've never had Blitz titered, but I suppose I should if only for my own information. I wish they would accept a titer here in PA in lieu of a rabies vac. Frankly, I'm not so sure I'm going to give him another rabies vac after next year even though it's required by law. He'll be 6 on Christmas day, my gift after I lost my heart dog, Dylan. We take him camping, but I have yet to be asked for a proof of vaccination. I hesitate myself to allow my doctor to give me all the vacs she suggests. Had my first ever flu shot last year, refused the pneumonia vac. Never had one. First do no harm? Dodd is the bomb, isn't she? Kudos to her for commiting the greater part of her life to the welfare of our dogs. Thanks to all for an educational discussion. Nothing upsets me more than to read a post written by the owner of a dog they adore that is not well. It's heartbreaking to me and always brings back the sad memories of my first GSD that I miss to this day although he's been gone 6 years now. If you own a healthy GSD, count your blessings. Owners like sh100 warm my heart and I must admit if I had been able to find buyers like him, I'd still be breeding dogs.

Blitzen you might want to take a look at the work of Polly Matzinger. The whole self/ non- self theory never made sense to me because why would it be so selective and not recognize self in the knee but recognize it elsewhere. I learned about Polly from a Wall Street Journal article. She put together a team that went back and repeated the experiment from the 50's that the whole self/non-self autoimmune theory was based on using neophyte mice. Lo and behold they came to radically different conclusions - primarily it was not a matter of the body being allergic to itself or "eating itself" but the body being insensitive(not recognizing)to microscopic damage being done to it. This fits right in with the increasing knowledge we are gaining that points to a relationship to bacterial and viral infections as the underlying cause for many diseases such as heart disease and arthritis. What the Wall St article was about was the reluctance of the scientific community to accept the team results in part at least because the team was led by a woman (sigh). I have not had time to read much of her work but if you search her name and autoimmune there is a wealth of info. Here is the search I used "polly " NIH autoimmune. Here is one of the articles it will pull up - http://cmmg.biosci.wayne.edu/asg/polly.html. Since most Docs who should be keeping up on this stuff(like rheumatologists) have never heard of her work and theories I doubt many vets know about the changing research in this area either.

Hi TIG, MD's and vets are taught "by the book" and until recently few ever even thought out of the box. I admire Dodd very much because she took that leap of faith and we all know how her research is benefitting pet animals. I tried to find a holistic vet when Dylan was diagnosed with leukemia, the thought of those chemo drugs, ugh. The only one within a reasonable driving distance banned dogs because they "stunk up" her waiting room and scared her cats. I didn't want to drive hours with a dog with cancer in the event of am emergency - as it was I did have 3 emergencies with him during the chemo. So we used a vet oncologist and used the conventional drugs. Sadly he only lived for 6 months after his diagnosis. Thanks for the info about Matzinger, I plan to read it. There is still much we need to learn about the human body and the immune system still remains a mystery in many ways. It's the same for animals. Many times MD's and vets follow the same general protocol - never over look the obvious, select the least harmful drug that might be effective and then treat to effect. If that fails, begin anew. A toss of the coin. In vetereinary medicine there are generally few funded studies unless it is a disease that has a human model or if they are privy to private donations. The AKC has taken a huge step by establishing the Canine Health Foundation. I do know that atopy is beoming more and more frequent in all breeds of dogs. I suspect if Louise's figures above were updated they would show an increase in this breed of dogs testing positive for reacting to certain irritants. It's not unusal to read on this breed board and others almost every day a question regarding an atopic GSD. IMO all these combo vaccines are a major contributor to this problem. I don't expect we will have in the foreseeable future a clear answer to why so many dogs are atopic. I tend to err on the side of caution and would never use such a dog for breeding, would take a long, hard look at the parents before breeding them again, and would certainly never repeat a breeding that has already produced immuno surpressed progeny. It's not just a superficial skin issue, it's way more complicated.

Blitzen: "I suspect if Louise's figures above were updated they would show an increase in this breed of dogs testing positive for reacting to certain irritants." ********************************************************************************************** Blitzen, I am generally on the same page with you when discussing health/genetic propensities of the breed. Of course, more dogs that are tested may be positive for atopy. They are being tested because they already have clinical symptoms. However, if if your assertions are valid, why have my own dogs (first, with American lines--later, with German lines--over a span of several decades) not suffered from atopy? We only hear about dogs with atopy--not about those dogs without it. I'm not talking about the actual number of GSDs with atopy. I want to know what this incidence is in proportion to the total GSD population (which is also increasing in number). Yes, it's true that I don't routinely treat for fleas (no prophylactic internal products for the dogs, no topical treatments--nor any pesticides for the house or yard), no heartworm preventatives, no routine worming, no poly-valent vaccines. Also, for the past ~12 years, I have fed a primarily raw diet. However, I did not have all of these husbandry practices in the earlier decades during which I never experienced atopy in my critters. Because of one's individual experiences with atopy and with the advent of internet discussion boards, I believe that one may run the risk of generalizing from one's personal experiences to the general population of GSDs.

I wish I could say the same Louise, I'm 2 for 2 with allergic GSD's. Blitz's scratching is mild and seasonal so far and hasn't required much other than some benedryl and a little pred now and then. Not many days go by here that at least one person doesn't ask about their GSD's scratching and others chime in saying they have had the same problems. I've had numerous PM's from GSD owners who are desensitizing their GSD's after skin testing. It's not only GSD's. I realize that most GSD owners are not on the PDB or other breeder boards. Since there are so many GSD's I guess all we have to judge by are the dogs we see or know of and I know of a lot of them that have allergy problems. I recall seeing a lot of them when I was a tech too. I don't know why you've never had an allergic dog, but if you can figure that out I'll bet you could make a lot of money selling that information LOL. I wish I knew why I have had 2.