DNA tests and Laboratories

[Mikael]

As I understand from an earlier topic on this subject, the DNA test for HD is mush more complex then the Dwarf DNA test, and will take mush more research, lab time and dogs (200)… and I think the price therefore is not so high compered to the Dwarf test…

But I understand it will not be easy to get 200 owners to pay 300 euro, especially when some has more then one dog, and it will not be possible for owners in some country’s to pay this neither…

What I’m trying to say is, I do not think any other lab will do or can do a DNA test for the CsW breed for less than 300 euro/dog… not today anyway… (if not the lab Mijke knows can do it for less)

But I think that Ina has find the right lab, as it already have a funtion HD DNA test for GSD, and work whit DNA tests for ED and epilepsy to…

I think we are to try to find a way to get funds, but I do not think that will be easy, unless the lab can help us whit that…

I do not know the price for normal HD x-ray in Germany, but in Sweden I think it is about 200 euro including the official result… therefore by Swedish standard a HD DNA test for 300 euro sounds reasonable...

Best regards / Mikael

If you are all having issues with paying that much to fund the research, why not try something like fundraisers to help pay? Hosting things like a dog walk where people pay an amount like $20 (whatever an equivalent for you would be) to participate is a great way to raise money like that. All you'd have to do is find a place to do it, throw a cheap lunch together, and explain to people why it's a good cause. You can also encourage participants to raise extra money on their own to help donate.

Also, would it be possible to take donations at dog shows? You could explain to people that the money goes towards genetic HD research.

There's no reason the money for the research has to be placed souly on the owners of the dogs. This type of research benefits EVERY dog breed, because all research has to start somewhere. I'm not sure how feasible all this would be for all of you (I know this type of thing is very common in the US, though) but I figured I'd throw it out there for you, just in case.

[Mikael]

Originally Posted by Vicky

If you are all having issues with paying that much to fund the research, why not try something like fundraisers to help pay? Hosting things like a dog walk where people pay an amount like $20 (whatever an equivalent for you would be) to participate is a great way to raise money like that. All you'd have to do is find a place to do it, throw a cheap lunch together, and explain to people why it's a good cause. You can also encourage participants to raise extra money on their own to help donate.

Also, would it be possible to take donations at dog shows? You could explain to people that the money goes towards genetic HD research.

There's no reason the money for the research has to be placed souly on the owners of the dogs. This type of research benefits EVERY dog breed, because all research has to start somewhere. I'm not sure how feasible all this would be for all of you (I know this type of thing is very common in the US, though) but I figured I'd throw it out there for you, just in case.

In Sweden we have about five CsV, and most people do not know that the breed exist at all, most of the people at the Swedish Kennel Club think it is not a recognized breed, and some insurance company´s will not insure are hybrid´s

I think it might work better whit a big breed like GSD... but the CsW breed is a very small and reare breed

But I did ask people here before if we should start a CsV fundation, for future blood lines... the answer I got, was that there was no money needed So maybe we can ask the clubs to pay

Or start a CsV fundation now fore future health problems and blood lines ???

Best regards / Mikael

[mijke]

Ina: There is a validated test for GSD
Mijke: • Is this the price of € 300 for an (already for CsW validated) real test?
Ina: The price for the 24 dogs is 7 Euros for the storage from the 200 on it is 300 per dog

And all the people who want to pay € 300 for each dog for research, what do they have to pay when the test is really validated?? (what is the price for GSD owners for the test?)
Or then the new test is for FREE for these owners??

Mijke: • Who is the owner of the blood sample? The owner? The group that manage the data? The lab?
Ina: The lab

Hmmmmm…. Personal I am never happy with such deals when a lab is a owner of a database….

Mijke: • And who can decide for what tests the blood is used in future?
Ina: The lab but you can say you don´t want your blood to be used for anything else

That is not the problem I mean….
All labs/university’s who are asking 4ml EDTA blood for a specific test are also collecting blood for themselves. And they use this for all kind of research.

But when an individual owner storage blood in a data base, this owner can every time decide by himself which test he want to do from that blood (in all kind of labs). And he can ask the storage lab to distillate DNA and send to another lab.

The same a group of owners of an DNA research data base can do the same. But they also can ask several labs to do research for a specific test because they have a lot of blood samples (and that is interesting for a lab)

BUT when a lab is an owner they can decidewhat they want to do with the blood! And in future it is possible that they do not want to send distelated DNA of such a group to an other lab for test or research.

Originally Posted by Mikael

As I understand from an earlier topic on this subject, the DNA test for HD is mush more complex then the Dwarf DNA test, and will take mush more research, lab time and dogs (200)… and I think the price therefore is not so high compered to the Dwarf test…

Maybe I did understand wrong, but I think this is not the price for a HD test! (Because there is yet not a HD test validated for CsW)
I think this price is only for research, so they can validate the test in future.

And of course when there ever will be such a HD test in future that makes that a owner do not have to make x-rays, then the price is reasonable

Originally Posted by Mikael

What I’m trying to say is, I do not think any other lab will do or can do a DNA test for the CsW breed for less than 300 euro/dog… not today anyway… (if not the lab Mijke knows can do it for less)

There will be not one lab that will do a DNA test for a disease for Free!
But there are labs that are doing research for free! (like the lab in Frence that is working on PRA test specific for CsW)
And only when they have a validated test for the breed owners have to pay for such a test.

Originally Posted by Mikael

In Sweden we have about five CsV, and most people do not know that the breed exist at all, most of the people at the Swedish Kennel Club think it is not a recognized breed, and some insurance company´s will not insure are hybrid´s

I think it might work better whit a big breed like GSD... but the CsW breed is a very small and reare breed

But I did ask people here before if we should start a CsV fundation, for future blood lines... the answer I got, was that there was no money needed So maybe we can ask the clubs to pay

Or start a CsV fundation now fore future health problems and blood lines ???

Best regards / Mikael

I don't think it necessarily needs to be a whole big organization or anything, just dog owners/lovers of any breed that want to give a little something to help research. People give donations all the time to help fund research for all sorts of diseases that face humans, I think people might be interested to help fund research for dogs as well. Just getting people together for one day to raise money wouldn't have to be a whole start of an organization or anything. But, I can see a problem if it's in a general population that is very spread out, this sort of thing works best in highly populated areas, like urban cities or suburbs, that's why I suggested hitting up people at dog shows.

All I'm saying, is it doesn't just have to be for CsV owners. It doesn't even have to be by people that know what the breed even IS, the fundraising could help spread awareness of the breed, as well!

[Mikael]

Originally Posted by mijke

Maybe I did understand wrong, but I think this is not the price for a HD test! (Because there is yet not a HD test validated for CsW)
I think this price is only for research, so they can validate the test in future.

And of course when there ever will be such a HD test in future that makes that a owner do not have to make x-rays, then the price is reasonable

No, I think you got it all right, it will be research the first 200 dogs and maybe more, if they not can find some short cut (resemblance from the GSD tests) to make it whit less individuals, as I understand that is why they wont 24 dogs to se if there is a resemblance to the DNA HD pattern on the two breeds

But if they need 200 dogs or more that is about all owners and breeders that are interested to do the HD DNA test today, and after that it will not be eny big money to earn for the lab, just a cople of tests per year, I think that is way they will demand money from the start ???

As I understan there is about 7000 CsW in the world, the number of GSD is probably way over 1´000´000 dogs, therefore I think that most labs that do HD DNA research for a small breed like the CsW will demand money from the start...

But if we can find a good lab that do HD DNA research and wont a small population to do research on, I will be very happy to pay less or the 300 euro after we knows that the DNA test will be valid and approved

But I think are chances are very small, and we will have to pay the 300 euro from the start if we can not find any funds...

But I agree, that we must be the one to own the data base and blood samples, if the lab wonts to do more research that might help are breed maybe we can send two blood samples from the start ? one for us and one for them ??? and mayby we can get a discount on are 300 euro in exchange ???

Best regards / Mikael

[Mikael]

Hello again

Just wonder how the results from a HD DNA test would look like ???

Is it just positive or negative, or can one see the degrease and risks in % ???

Can somebody link to a HD DNA test result from a GSD ???

Kindly regards / Mikael

[canislupus]

Hello all,
I called yesterday the president of the fund " Gesellschaft für kynologische Forschung"
The president told me that they had this year only 60.000€ to spend, that she thinks next year it will be less and that there are so many institutions who want to get some money from them.
So we have no chamce to get any money from them. Our breed is too small and healthy. And our HD-project is not important for many people...

She also told me, that she does not trust in a test based on just 200 blood samples. For the german shepherd test they had thousands of blood samples.

@Mijke: what do you think about this? I am not experienced with validation of those tests. Is she right? How can we get to know if the test will be really good or if there will be more or less wrong results. (before we have to pay lots of money...)

She told me to think about spending so much money on a maybe not very good test or maybe better talking to some Experts for genetics and work together with them.

so, what´s the right way?
Tanja

[michaelundinaeichhorn]

I am not Mijke but I read publications in vet-magazins about it and tried to find out more since almost a year.

Originally Posted by canislupus

She also told me, that she does not trust in a test based on just 200 blood samples. For the german shepherd test they had thousands of blood samples.

@Mijke: what do you think about this? I am not experienced with validation of those tests. Is she right? How can we get to know if the test will be really good or if there will be more or less wrong results. (before we have to pay lots of money...)

When they did the GSH-test there wasn´t any test workin at all, when you have a test you can see by much smaller numbers if there is a correlation, to find out if there is a correlation they need the 24 dogs, if there isn´t any correlation they anyway won´t carry on. The 24 dogs will cost only 7 Euros each. If we stop there and wait how things show in future we still would have the possibility to carry on later.
The most important question is how much the test results correlate with the breeding results, to know that we would need to know how long the GSH do select with this test and if the HD-statistics show a signific decrease of HD,

Originally Posted by canislupus

She told me to think about spending so much money on a maybe not very good test or maybe better talking to some Experts for genetics and work together with them.

The test was validated by the genetic institute of a veterinary university by experts on dog-genetics.

Originally Posted by canislupus

so, what´s the right way?
Tanja

I think this is the point when everybody who knows about labs that do databases or knows about genetic projects on dogs should try to find out about the conditions of those labs.
We should start with a database as soon as possible and keep informed about all research projects.
I also think we should keep in touch with the HD-test in Hannover and find out how to raise funds for research. And we can only do all of this on an international basis. Research on dog genetics goes on worldwide.
So it makes sense to now collect people and dogs that are willing to cooperate. If we have a database with all informations research projects do need we could start at once. To build up an international database will take a lot of time.

What seems to be not that clear is even if tests like that in Hannover do work and show a signific benefit, the validation of this kind of test takes 1-2 years. If we build up a new group of people and a new database and so on for every test of interest we all won´t live when the first test can be started.
It makes most sense to build up a database in the best lab we can find for this and have everything ready when there is a project of interest.

Ina

[mijke]

Hi Ina,

Thanks for explanation!

I agree that it is worth to start with the 24 CsW to see if there is any correlation with GSH results in the test.
So witch CsW lines are you looking for? Are there any specific CsW’s in a country that they need? Which line/dog in Holland can they use? (on wolfdog-healthinfo. you ca find all Dutch CsW with HD results)
Please mail me when you need help from Holland.

And when there is a correlation, we first can look how it did work out in GSH world before we start with the expensive testing.

Of course an international CsW DNA database would be wonderful!
But I am afraid that there will be first a lot of problems about who will/can manage this data base and who will be the owners. And also what we will do with breeding policy to reduce health problems that can be tested.

Maybe the most easy and simple start is that all CsW owners send EDTA blood for DNA storage to the same lab.
So every dog owner remains the official owner of the DNA storage of his dog. And everybody here can announce if they have send DNA for storage in this lab.

And maybe then it is possible to make on this site a list of all CsW with a storage of blood in that lab.

When in future there are interesting test (for example PRA or epilepsy) or a lab needs blood for validation of a test for CsW, we can write about this on the forum.
And every individual owner can decide to cooperate or not.

So on this moment it is maybe an idea only to choose a lab with a good price for only storage and good price and conditions for DNA distillation.

On this moment I know a lab in Germany where individuals can send EDTA for only DNA storage for €16,50.
When owners want to send DNA to another lab, they will not charge additional money for sending DNA.
The only thing is that storage there is only for 10 years.
And I do not know yet what are their possibilities and conditions for longer storage.
But I’ll inform you later!

[michaelundinaeichhorn]

HI Mijke,

Originally Posted by mijke

Hi Ina,

Thanks for explanation!

I agree that it is worth to start with the 24 CsW to see if there is any correlation with GSH results in the test.
So witch CsW lines are you looking for? Are there any specific CsW’s in a country that they need? Which line/dog in Holland can they use? (on wolfdog-healthinfo. you ca find all Dutch CsW with HD results)
Please mail me when you need help from Holland.

And when there is a correlation, we first can look how it did work out in GSH world before we start with the expensive testing.

They need as many different lines as possible. I think the easiest way will be if everybody interested (especially those with HD-dogs) get in contact and we will decide wich dogs make most sense. I already was offered help from Italy and the Czech Republik and Slovakia, of your country and of course from Germany and France. It shouldn´t be so difficult to find the best first 24 dogs.

Originally Posted by mijke

So on this moment it is maybe an idea only to choose a lab with a good price for only storage and good price and conditions for DNA distillation.

On this moment I know a lab in Germany where individuals can send EDTA for only DNA storage for €16,50.
When owners want to send DNA to another lab, they will not charge additional money for sending DNA.
The only thing is that storage there is only for 10 years.
And I do not know yet what are their possibilities and conditions for longer storage.
But I’ll inform you later!

That was exactly what I had in mind. Find the best lab and as many people as possible who send blood there. When we got this far we can go on to the next steps.

Ina

[mijke]

Originally Posted by canislupus

@Mijke: what do you think about this? I am not experienced with validation of those tests. Is she right? How can we get to know if the test will be really good or if there will be more or less wrong results. (before we have to pay lots of money...)

Hi Tanja,
For me it is more easier to ex-plain in Dutch! But I ‘ll try to explain it simple in English language.

Personal I think something else is mentioned with “validation” between the DNA dwarfism test and de DNA HD test.

When genetic specialist are doing research for a genetic mutation it costs years.
I’ll try to explain how it did work with the dwarfism test:

The specialists did start to compare DNA of dwarfs, their parents (= carriers), brothers, sisters with other dogs (which they did know they were free). This research did take years and a lot of blood samples! And in this case the genetic specialist could locate the mutation! And they were lucky that the mutation for dwarfism is “single“ recessive mutation. (I don’t know the correct translation)
When they did know where to look for this dwarfism gen mutation, they could compare the mutated gen of the GSH with a SWH who was a proven carrier (parent of a dwarf) and then the test was also validated for SWH.

After that I only had to find only 1 CsW dwarf or 1 proven parent of a dwarf to validate the dwarfism test for CsW breed. (because the mutation was "single" already known and theyonlydid have to compare)

But for a DNA HD test it will be maybe more complicated! Because a lot of genetic specialist expect that HD is not caused by a “single” recessive mutation but will have “multi factor” causes.
Maybe there is not yet found an exact location of a gen mutation. And they have found only the differences in DNA between HD A and HD D/E dogs.

That also explains why they first need 24 CsW’s to see if the differences are the same. And when that is a fact, later on they can compare a lot more CsW’s with and without HD to find the exact differences. And so in future they maybe can find the DNA mutations that causes HD. But that will take a lot of time!!

But maybe I am wrong! So please Ina, correct me when there are other reasons why they need more Csw’s for validation.

[michaelundinaeichhorn]

Originally Posted by mijke

But maybe I am wrong! So please Ina, correct me when there are other reasons why they need more Csw’s for validation.

HD is for sure caused by several genes, that has to be so because there are more than one bone involved in the joint and there are different forms of causes of HD (to small Caput femoris, to low Norberg degree and so on). Though it is no longer discussed that HD is a genetic desease there are factors like too much training or too highly energetic food in the growth period that have a great influence on the severeness of the genetic caused desease.
So there is not only one reason or one gene mutation that has to be found but very likely the combination of genetic factors that is the reason, at least several different genes. That of course makes research much more difficult, takes much more time and dogs.
Anyway every genetic test that has been validated on one breed has to be checked on every new breed because there are defects with identical symptoms but caused by different mutations. But when you already have one working test you look in every new breed if the genes for the defect are the same or not. If you look for one mutated gene like in the dwarf test you only need one dog, if you look for different genes like in polygenic defect like HD you need more dogs because one dog with HD E may show a defect on the genes 1+3 and the other on 2+4 (just as an example, I am not that far in detailes about this test), or the combination of 1+4 causes severe HD, the combination of 1 + 2 doesn´t.
So as far as I understood they only need 24 dogs to check if they show the same mutations but about 200 to validate a working test.

[Juniorwolf]

Hello Ina and/or Mijke,

I am trying to follow this post, but sometimes it is a little too technical for me... something I would like to know(I think Mikael also asked this question earlier) is how excat will a HD DNA test be, I mean if they only have found the difference between HD A and HD D/E ? does this mean that, when the test is validated, it will only be possibe to say if the result is very good or very bad(not as excat as xray) ? ...or did I misunderstand ?

Thanks for keeping this very interesting topic public, so I(and others) can follow this

Greetings Rolf

[mijke]

Ina did have contact with the university.
So I think she can explain the best , what on this moment the (validated) DNA test for the GSH exactly can tell about the HD of a individual GSH.

[michaelundinaeichhorn]

I just asked them to make sure I didn´t get anything wrong.
In future it will be possible to make a selection of studs or dogs with this test and you can already start in puppyage. You can say which dogs are likely to get HD, which pairings are not sensible to make or which dog should be left out of breeding.
At this actual period you need both the x-rays and the blood to control the test (Yes I also think they can´t charge 300 Euros for that at the moment!!) and there is no result of breeding-selection at the moment in GSH, what means it will take several years till you will have statistics.
I still think this is a test of very high value for every breed but I also agree that there is no sense to pay for it as long as we have to pay for it on our own because the benefit at the moment for the breeder himself is low and our breed isn´t able to bring up this amount of money for a research projekt.

So in my opinion we should start with a blood bank, make a database for that dogs and wait for interesting research projects and the result of the test in the GSH.
DNA-tests will be the future and a good thing to avoid health problems in breeds so we should get ready for that.

[Juniorwolf]

Hi Ina,

Thanks for your answer

So this is how I understod it : for many years to come, xrays will still be necessary and sometime in a far away future, it will be possible to give only HD-results "good" or "bad" by DNA, but not more specific than that... and maybe in an even further away future it will be possible to give exact(A,B,C,D,E) HD-results from DNA ...for both GSD and CSW !

Please correct me if I am wrong ?

Greetings Rolf

[saschia]

Hi Rolf,

I don't think you'll ever be able to give HD A/B/C/D by DNA, as there is a lot of environmental influence on the definitive results. But you'll be able to say if the dog or it's offspring will be more or less succeptible to having dysplasia or not. You can never rule out damage made by irresponsible owners (like hard training of obese dog during it's development).

[michaelundinaeichhorn]

Originally Posted by saschia

Hi Rolf,

I don't think you'll ever be able to give HD A/B/C/D by DNA, as there is a lot of environmental influence on the definitive results. But you'll be able to say if the dog or it's offspring will be more or less succeptible to having dysplasia or not. You can never rule out damage made by irresponsible owners (like hard training of obese dog during it's development).

Exactly, the systhem of A,B etc. was created apart from telling how severe the problem of the specific dog is to say something about his breeding worth (I am sure that is not the right English word but hope it is understandable). If a dog is A,B or C doesn´t matter for the dog, even the C is not likely to cause problems in a family dog but it is important if you look a pairings. When you can judge about this by DNA there is no need for this classification any longer.

If you look at some A dogs you will find that an A and even As over several generations don´t grant for A offspring. A very good example are the brothers Good Boy and Grey Wolf z Molu es, they are even out of one litter but the HD-results of their offspring are two different worlds (and some of the bad resulst seem to have been removed) and nobody can tell me this all results in stupid puppy-owners ore classification sythems, it´s bad luck in genetics. If we would have a test we could say in advance how the results of a pairing are likely to be.

[Juniorwolf]

Hi Saschia & Ina,

Thanks for you reply

I understand that the DNA-test can not give an exact result of the degree of HD in a specific dog(due to environmental influence), but can the DNA test not say something about what degree of HD the specific dog have purely geneticly ? if it will be in % or by A,B,C,D,E can only be a matter of how to calgulate it ...I think ?

Greetings Rolf