Sensory Neuropathy

[PatG]

Hi all, update on Jem's condition.
I now have the report from the Glasgow Vet School and it makes depressing reading. It's Sensory Neuropathy and Jem is now on Gabapentin (300mg, 3 times daily) in addition to her current antibiotics as one of her pads is infected again The condition is inherited and progressive and caused by a recessive gene....so she got one gene from her sire and one from her dam. The report states that the dam and sire should not be bred from again and Jem's littermates should not be bred from either. The sire and dam may not have this condition but they do carry the gene that causes it. The condition has been described in German Short-Haired Pointers, English Pointers, Border Collies, Springer spaniels,long-haired dachsunds, Jack Russells, Golden Retriever, French spaniels and whippets....but not in working cockers before hence the Glasgow Vet School interest in Jem's case. They have some of her blood for their genetic research.
The future for Jem is uncertain. She is severely restricted now regarding exercise and her paws require a huge amount of care and management and constant vigilance on my part to make sure she doesn't start licking chewing other paws/legs. Our life and the moment revolves around cleaning and bandaging her paws and putting on her collar to prevent access to her feet. Her affected paws are cleaned bandaged 3/4 times daily and covered 24/7. I am emotionally drained and I feel so sorry for Jem - she is in every other way a normal 9 month old cocker and needs more stimulation and exercise than she is allowed. I couldn't commit this amount of time and effort to her if I was employed - just not possible.

Please contact k.faller.1@research.gla.ac.uk if you know of any working cockers showing similar signs of this condition. She wants to do her best to help remove this gene from the working cocker gene pool - her research I hope will help do this. This may also be of interest...
http://www.vetbook.org/wiki/dog/index.p ... n_syndrome

Thanks again for all your previous suggestions, advice and supportive comments.
Pat

[Rascal]

I've put this post here for reference the original topic can be read here viewtopic.php?f=14&t=14888 if you wish to reply to Pat please do so in the original thread.

Rascal