As hard as it is for me to believe, still, I am all too familiar with this topic. I recently lost my 13 mo old GSD puppy to cardiomyopathy. She collapsed, without warning, and died right in front of me in my kitchen while we were playing tug. One second we were jumping and having our usual grand time, and in less than a minute, she was gone. It happened that fast.

My vet performed the necropsy and we immediately had her heart sent to Texas A&M for analysis. Her official cause of death was due to arrythmias associated with cardiomyopathy. Although I did not get a definition of which type of cardiomyopathy, I did get descriptions of the condition of her heart and heart tissues. Her left ventricle was abnormally thicken and her heart muscle was filled with multi-focal fibrosis.

From everything I have read on the subject and also confirmed by my vet, cardiomyopathy, I was told, is a genetic condition...with rare exception. It is a familial disease of the heart muscle and is passed down through families. The only way I have read that a puppy can develop cardiomyopathy other than from its parents is by developing a serious infection such as parvo that invades the heart muscle. There are a couple of other pathogens I found that can also cause the fatal condition but they too are rare.

I am only providing information as I have received it and my breeder is replacing my puppy with a puppy of my choice when the time is right for me....no questions asked.

As an added note, my pup was healthy as a horse every day of her short life until the day I lost her. No colds, no fevers, no pano, no allergies, nothing. She was amazing. And trust me when I tell you that you have not lived until you sit helplessly and watch something you love more than life itself die in your arms and not be able to do anything to stop it. I do not blame my breeder for what happened because she was as horrified as I was and sometimes really bad things happen to really nice people...and to their dogs.

What incidences like this should do is put up a red flag to breeders to pay very close attention to what happened when these two lines crossed. All breeders know that recessives can creep in out of nowhere and knock us completely all off our feet. As a proactive breeder, in the case of cardiomyopathy, I would have an echo done on both parents and all progeny as I would want to try to find out for sure if this was a isolated incident or something more. I was also told that an OFA cardiac, even when performed by a cardiologist, can easily miss cardiomyopathy if the dog is not having an "event" at the time of the exam, especially in young, otherwise healthy puppies. But an echo always identifies the problem.

So unless a puppy was seriously ill at some point during it's life, the chances of it's cardiomyopathy being environmental is rare from my understanding to date.

I am not a vet, a specialist or a cardiologist. I am just a puppy buyer still trying to cope with and understand how I could lose what appeared to be an exceptional puppy in the wink of an eye...with no inkling that there was the slightest of problems. I don't know if I will ever get over what happened to her. It's been 6 weeks and I still play that moment over and over again in my mind.

The one consolation, if there is one, is my vet told me that as devastating as witnessing this event was for me, in reality it was a blessing for my beautiful girl. Had she not passed as result of sudden cardiac death, she would have gone through the various stages of congestive heart failure over the following months and there would have been nothing we could have done to prevent the inevitable. Medications might have slowed the process, but I would have still lost her prematurely. Cardiomyopathy is always fatal and I was told she probably would not have lived to see her 2nd birthday.

HELLO ALL, I am BEAR'S breeder.... Here is a link full of comments on Bear and his "condition". I will ask anyone to read it and see everything that is being said and that is going on. http://www.pedigreedatabase.com/gsd/forum/5849.html

FIRST OFF - We have signed documents that from several vets that say that this condition is NOT hereditary but that it is just a flaw in a dogs make up and NOT passed on through the parents. The vets say that this can be cause ALSO by environment. Feeding Lamb based dog food and many other environmental things. I do not accuse Bears owners of neglect but they do not think twice of posting all over the internet or anywhere else that it is. This was this families FIRST dog. This dog was carefull chosen from a long line of healthy dogs that have been tested and are certified. I will begin to take action if this woman does NOT stop spreading lies about my dogs and saying that I am NOT upholding my contract as I am DOING EVERYTHING possible to do what my contract states. This woman has not thought twice about spreading lies and RUMORS about this dog and the condition that he died of. I do not know why she is trying to scare other puppy owners about this and do not know what her end game is. This IS NOT A GENETIC CONDITION. We have a vet report from several reputable vets stating this. Please read over the link and look into it for yourselves and we will be open and HONEST in all things

Bear's Necropsy results were submitted to The White Shepherd Project, Patchwork Shepherds (ID, Bear's Breeder) and SureFire Shepherds (WA). Bear's brother from same litter is "Strider" (SureFire Aragorn of Dunedain) currently being breed by SureFire Shepherds.

Please feel free to call me,Bear's owner, with any questions at 208-331-2071. Laurie

"Bear" died on June 16, 2009 unexpectedly at only 15 months old. University of Idaho performed a necropsy which concluded he died of Hypertrophic CardioMyopathy.

Bear was a White AKC registered GSD.