Ceroid Lipofuscinosis

[Bartok]

Has anyone in rescue or even a breeder dealt with ceroid lipofuscinosis in a dog?

Mainly a puppy who has just started seizing and shows signs of it

ruling out a liver shunt today but vet is pretty certain it isn't a shunt and

pup shows a lot of characteristics listed for ceroid lipofuscinosis

Vet also consulting with an animal seizure specialist today

I believe in particular this. He is a young ACD

http://sydney.edu.au/vetscience/lida/dogs/search/disorder/358/Familial%20amaurotic%20idiocy

Edited May 20, 2014 by Bartok

[JulesP]

I have a dog with a liver shunt that has HE. And obviously CL is in border collies. What do you want to know?

[Bartok]

how old was the dog you had to deal with.

Was it having seizures

did you euthanize straight away

[Janba]

CL is non treatable, is inherited and fatal. It is a horrible disease and one that the DNA status of all breeding Border Collies should be known before they are bred from. I don't know if a DNA test is available for breeds other than Border Collies.

http://www.bccnsw.com/cl.html

[JulesP]

how old was the dog you had to deal with.

Was it having seizures

did you euthanize straight away

This is for a shunt not CL.

She was about 11 months old when she was diagnosed.

Yes she had seizures. She sort of lay on her side and twitched. It wasn't super violent. When she got up she was walking very strangely. She also did strange things like rub her head along walls and stand still like in a trance and flick her tongue in and out.

No I didn't euthanize. Her seizures have been controlled with a combination of medicine and food.

[Bartok]

how old was the dog you had to deal with.

Was it having seizures

did you euthanize straight away

This is for a shunt not CL.

She was about 11 months old when she was diagnosed.

Yes she had seizures. She sort of lay on her side and twitched. It wasn't super violent. When she got up she was walking very strangely. She also did strange things like rub her head along walls and stand still like in a trance and flick her tongue in and out.

No I didn't euthanize. Her seizures have been controlled with a combination of medicine and food.

Tests to rule out a shunt will be back today.

I also have contact with Sydney uni vet hospital and the professor who wrote the paper on CL

We obviously don't want pup to be in pain or stress if it is CL. He is about 5mths old and besides a few "weird" things he is happy boy, but obviously something that will get worse over time if it is CL

[JulesP]

Tests to rule out a shunt will be back today.

I also have contact with Sydney uni vet hospital and the professor who wrote the paper on CL

We obviously don't want pup to be in pain or stress if it is CL. He is about 5mths old and besides a few "weird" things he is happy boy, but obviously something that will get worse over time if it is CL

You really need to have a physical exam for a shunt - ultrasound etc. My dog's blood & bile tests were not that bad, I don't think them alone would have suggested a shunt.

Dogs with shunts are usually smaller and have issues with food. My girl was super fussy. She used to run into things too when she was a puppy.

ETA: My dog didn't appear to be sick and would run around at the park for hours

Edited May 20, 2014 by JulesP

[piper]

I did not realise ACDs were affected by CL? Sydney Uni who you provided the link to developed the DNA test for BCs so might be able to assist with testing.

How old is the puppy?

[Tassie]

From what I've read, age of onset for CL is approximately 15 -18 months. But that might be peculiar to Border Collies. The syndrome in your link sound similar but different, and maybe age of onset for that is younger.

Most BCs with CL were euthanised before age 2. There was no possibility of recovery. :-( Hence the absolute necessity of the genetic testing of breeding stock.

[dancinbcs]

This lab has many different breeds listed for CL testing but does not mention ACDs. Labolkin

There are different ages of onset in humans but in BCs as stated above the onset is not until about 15 months at the earliest. It takes that long for the waste product in the body that is not being eliminated to build up and cause a problem. Seizures are possible but not a main feature of CL. Dogs with CL seem to lose their co-ordination as if they cannot tell were the ground is. They can go blind and display odd behaviour like snapping at nothing or being frightened of a water bowl. In human children, all patients go blind eventually and the different parts of the nervous system start to shut down until they all fail but in children it can take about 4 years for the whole process to end in death.

My guess with a 5 month old puppy is liver shunt or some form of epilepsy.

[temperamentfirst]

I haven't heard of any CL with such an early onset.

Also, CL can't be managed or controlled, so its more likely to be a shunt or a form of epilepsy.

Sydney Uni did not develop the CL test - the late Dr Alan Wilton and Dr Scott Melville of UNSW were the ones who found the gene and hence the test. The gene in BCs was not the same as eg English Setters, so I doubt the BC test would work on ACDs.

[rajacadoo]

I bred an ACD bitch who was diagnosed with a liver shunt. Diagnosed at 6 months, and pts at 6 1/2 months, as there was nothing we did that helped her. Never bred her parents again, as thought to be genetic. Luckily we owned her, none of bro/sis was diagnosed with it, as far as I was able to find out. IMHO it's a problem in the breed, but getting breeders to talk about it, at the time, was near on impossible. Easier to bury their heads in the sand, than to talk about it ...

Good luck in her diagnosis...