Articles for Breeders

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Exercise Induced Collapse (EIC) in Labrador Retrievers

What is EIC?

Young, healthy Labrador retrievers sometimes suffer from a syndrome called Exercise Induced Collapse (EIC). It is associated with exercise intolerance and affected dogs can tolerate only mild or moderate exercise. These dogs normally collapse after 5 to 15 minutes of strenuous exercise, especially if the dog is overly excited or stressed. Symptoms include a wobbly gait and non-painful paralysis and the dog often losses control of its rear limbs. This is a newly characterized syndrome as veterinarians had previously thought it to be caused by malignant hyperthermia, hypoglycemia, electrolyte disturbances and cardiac rhythm disturbances to name just a few. The cause is however a genetic mutation. (Patterson et al., 2008; Taylor et al., 2009)

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Parvovirus Enteritis or "Catflu"

A guide for owners which deals with parvovirus (SAVF)

Parvovirus infection is a potentially fatal viral disease of dogs that affects primarily the gastrointestinal tract and the bone marrow of young dogs.

Signs of disease

Diarrhoea that is often bloody and with a characteristic pungent fetid smell.
Constant or intermittent vomiting.
Loss of appetite, listlessness, depression.
Sunken eyes and an inelastic skin [these are signs of dehydration].
Tender abdomen.

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Progressive Retinal Atrophy or (PRA-prcd)

What is Progressive Retinal Atrophy (PRA?)

Progressive Retinal Atrophy is a group of genetic eye disorders that share similar symptoms and occur in over 100 dog breeds. In dogs suffering from Progressive rod-cone degeneration (PRA-prcd) the cells of the rods and cones in the retina of the eye degenerate when the dog reaches early adolescence. PRA-prcd is diagnosed as a late onset disease as the retina cells develops normally after birth and then starts to degenerate later in life (Acland et al. 1998). Night blindness normally develops at around 2 ? 3 years of age and progresses to complete blindness at around 5 years of age (Andre et al., 2008). Close to 30 dog breeds are known to develop this disease as indicated in Table 1 (Zangerl et al., 2006; Andre et al., 2008).