EPILEPSY— in Chinese Cresteds? by Karen FisCher-smith Crest-Vue Chinese Cresteds | Apache Junction, AZ
D id you know that Epilepsy is one of the fastest grow- ing health problems our breed now faces? After 13 years of breeding I found out that a dog I bred, finished and later sold was diag- nosed with Epilepsy (EP). How could that be? I did not even know that sei- zures or EP was a problem in this breed and I surely had not seen any problems before. Of course over the years, I had heard of “dogs” having EP or seizures— but not Chinese Cresteds. When I received this news, to say I was dev- astated, would be an understatement! I, as a responsible and caring breeder, have always done more than my share of health testing and did all I could do to breed happy, healthy dogs. Where did I go wrong? First of all I want to make it clear that I am, by no means, an expert on Chinese Cresteds, Epilepsy, or anything else for that matter. I am just one per- son who was faced with a major health problem in a dog that I was responsible for bringing into this world—and I now felt obligated to find some answers. What I have found out is quite shocking and I would like to share some of this new found information with anyone After the initial shock wore off and the tears stopped, I was faced with a choice of what to do now. Do I quit breeding? Do I spray and neuter every- thing related to the dog with seizures and later diagnosed with Epilepsy? What would everyone else do? One of the first calls I made was to my own vets whom I trust and respect. They both told me that I shouldn’t panic and that little was known on the mode of inheri- tance of EP in dogs—or humans for that matter. Okay, well how could that be? I know many dog people and spent hours upon hours on the phone and comput- er with people who had other breeds that also “deal” with seizures or EP. who cares to read this article. Where do I start?
Many seemed to think that this was ok and even acceptable. Acceptable? Not in my world! I wanted answers and swore not to breed another lit- ter until I learned everything that I could about the problem in this breed, Chinese Cresteds. The first thing I did was take advan- tage of the Internet and share this prob- lem with the hundreds of Facebook dog friends that I had. To my amazement, people started sending me private mes- sages and telling me that they too had either faced this problem themselves— or knew of other Cresteds that also had seizures. So the next thing I did was start mak- ing a “list” of dogs that I was told about and if the information was not given to me by the breeder or owner of the dog—I started tracking down the owner or breeder. Of course, as you can imag- ine, I ruffled a lot of feathers along the way. But I would not quit just because my feelings got hurt and because others choose to bury their dogs—and their problems with them. I was on a mission for answers—and truth. Let the research begIn! The next thing I needed was a pedi- gree program to keep and sort informa- tion. After looking through programs, I contacted Susan Miller and she gra- ciously not only shared with me what program she had used to track health problems for the past 20 years—but lis- tened to my concerns, answered many questions and shared all the work of health, title and pedigree data she and her mother, Jackie Miller, had gathered for all these years. What a blessing and an asset this information has been! (Thank you again Jackie and Susan!) For many months, I spent hundreds of hours staring at the computer look- ing at pedigrees of Chinese Cresteds that have been shared with me that had seizures, confirmed EP (by vets), or unconfirmed EP. For each dog that I learned about, I printed a 5 generation
pedigree—and I filed it. After I had col- lected about 50pedigrees anobvious pat- tern started to emerge. Could Epilepsy be hereditary? As time went on and my inquiring mind—and big mouth—continued to talk to other long time breeders, I knew something had to be done, but what? I stared at pedigrees so long my head hurt! Was what I was seeing on paper really so easy to understand and obvi- ous? I just had to have more answers and someone suggested that I contact Lisa Shaffer, PhD at Paw Print Genetics to see if maybe they would be interest- ed in looking at the pedigree data I had been able to gather and sort. So this was my next step. I sent Lisa an email and within a short amount of time, she replied that she would be willing to look at the pedigree information I had gathered. I then mailed her the pile of pedigrees (about 85 dogs at this point) for her to study. Within a few months, I received a reply and Lisa was very interested and eager to take on this project. Thank you Lord—someone else seemed to care about this as much as I did! This is how our research project started. What next? Now that there seemed to be some kind of hereditary link proven on paper, we needed DNA samples to begin research. I again went to Facebook and made a plea for people to willingly send in DNA from dogs with seizures/EP, their parents and full and half siblings. Of course we knew that blood samples were best, but I knew that most people would not be willing to go through the expense of taking their dogs to a vet to have blood drawn and then more expense to have blood shipped—espe- cially from foreign countries! So Paw Print Genetics agreed to accept cheek swabs for DNA collection. It didn’t take long to realize that most people could not find acceptable swabs, so I started off buying a box of 100 swabs (4 swabs
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