Aiha

[SkySoaringMagpie]

Just wondering if anyone from a breed that has AIHA as a common problem knows the answer to this. Does whether the condition is inherited or not have any bearing on the recovery prospects for the dog?

[Danois]

Don't know the answer to your question sorry but there is a great Yahoo group called CIMDA which is all about immune mediated diseases in dogs. It is led by someone quite authorative in the subject and (when I was a member) who is very open to questions.

[dancinbcs]

No one has worked out what causes it and there has been nothing to indicate it is hereditary. Like cancer, it is increasing in all dogs, purebred, crossbred and mongrel but no one knows why.

[SkySoaringMagpie]

Thanks ladies, it's more a question for my own education rather than about an immediate health matter. I just saw someone mention in a forum recently that their vet had put forward this hypothesis and I had never heard it before. I suppose I'm concerned that people might think that if the dog dies it's inherited and if the dog doesn't die it's not, which I don't think is correct.

[Stitch]

From my experience it depends on which specialist vet you talk to, mainly because there is no definite scientific proof that auto immune disease are definitely hereditary.

Vets that are cautious will usually say that if you want to be sure you must presume that there is an inheritability factor there.

I suppose you could think of it in terms of a certain dog having a genetic "weakness" or "predisposition" to develop an auto immune problem rather than actually having the inheritable problem itself - if you know what I mean!

Throw into the mix that we really don't know how all the immunisations and chemicals we dose our dogs with actually effect their overall health. We know that the chemicals prevent heartworm, intestinal worms, fleas and ticks all do their job but are they having a more sinister effect on the dogs health? We know that the immunisations usually prevent them from getting life threatening illnesses like parvo etc. but again what damage are they doing at the same time??

I would not breed with a dog that had an auto immune problem.