I just had my itchy 15-month old GSD tested for allergies. The dermatologist did a skin test for 71 different allergens. I wasn't surprised he tested positive for some - I was surprised at how many: 31. Yikes! This puts a serious damper on any thought of breeding him. Despite his many positive traits, perpetuating allergy and skin problems is not what I want to do to the breed.

What also surprised me is one of the strongest reactions was to tobacco. Despite being one of the original militant anti-smokers, I hadn't thought of that as a potential allergen in dogs. Something for dog-owning smokers to think about.

I'm curious...was this a blood test, Anita?

What type of diet?

 Quote: AnitaGard

The dermatologist did a skin test for 71 different allergens. I wasn't surprised he tested positive for some - I was surprised at how many: 31. Yikes! This puts a serious damper on any thought of breeding him.

You are absolutely correct about not breeding an allergic dog.

It's an immune system problem, and allergies do indeed have a large genetic component.

http://www.k9web.com/dog-faqs/medical/canine-allergies.html

I know you didn't ask this and probably know it (since you had the skin testing done), but it's a good place to point out that skin (scratch) tests done by a vet dermatologist, even though they have about a 70% accuracy rate, are the gold standard of environmental/inhalant allergy tests. Blood tests are *far* less accurate, but are often resorted to because of the lower cost, time involved, and no specialist vet required.



(ID-ing food allergies, again, requires a strict elimination diet.)

I've only ever heard of the blood test (and yes, I've heard it isn't considered very accurate) so it's good to know there is another, more reliable, option.

Will try to answer everyone's questions. Ya'll better go potty first though, cause this'll be long.

1. Not a blood test. A skin test, similar to what's done with people. An area about 3" x 4" on the dog's side is shaved. Several rows of dots are made with a Sharpie, then the vet injects a very small amount of allergen above and below (or beside) each dot. The position of each injection corresponds to a chart on paper so if an injection site turns red, the vet looks on the chart to determine which allergen caused the reaction.

As Connie said, this test is the gold standard for inhalant allergies. The allergens used are tailored to the geographic area in which you live, so if you're in Alaska, they shouldn't be testing for orange trees (yes, that was on my guy's gotcha list - and I live in Florida with 5 citrus tree in my back yard ). It is not used to test food allergies. Most reactions occur within a couple of hours, but some may be delayed by a day or two, so the owner has to check the site for the next two days and inform the vet of any change (or send a good quality digital photo so the vet can make the determination). Once the offending allergens are determined, you either eliminate / limit the dog's exposure from then on, or the vet cooks up a vaccine tailored to those allergens. The vaccine is administered over time and (most of the time) gradually desensitizes the dog's system to those allergens. If you start with a young dog, there is some thought / belief / evidence that you can "teach" the immune system not to overreact in general, so the dog is less likely to develop other allergies later on. Again, as Connie pointed out, there is a 70% success rate with this test, and it will be a while before I know whether the vaccine is effective.

2. I got my puppy at 3 months. The breeder had him on Nutro. I will confess to feeding him a raw + kibble diet at first, but eliminated the kibble completely when the first bag was used up, so he's been on totally raw since about 5 months. Basically the Leerburg raw diet plan, although I didn't start using Salmon oil until he was about 10 months old. He now gets 4 pumps of Grizzly a day, which according to the label is .48 fl oz, or roughly 15 grams. Although I believe the raw diet and salmon oil has mitigated the problem, it obviously cannot totally compensate for genetic issues.

3. Connie didn't really ask a question, but did make some of the same observations the dermatologist did:

A. Blood tests for inhalant allergies aren't very reliable - the dermatologist won't even offer one of them because he says it's so bad.

B. Even the skin test isn't totally reliable, but it's the best there is. You just have to be willing to have a funny-looking dog for a little while. And fork over some dough. In my case, the evaluations, tests, shampoos, antihistamines, vaccine, etc will total close to $1,000.

C. There's a genetic component. Unfortunately, GSDs are quite prone to allergies and skin issues. There's even one condition called "German shepherd dog pyoderma" http://www.jaaha.org/cgi/content/abstract/33/4/355 because it's more or less only found in GSDs. There was a thread on this board a while ago that mentioned the controversy over a former breed warden in Germany suggesting Malinois blood be brought in to mitigate this and some other breed specific problems. Maybe someone who doesn't hate the search function on this site as much as I do can scare that thread up for folks' reference.

Whew! Now, if anyone's interested, and if I can borrow a friend's digital camera today (mine is on the fritz), I'll take a photo of my dog's test site and post it somewhere so people can see what it looks like. I'll also scan the code sheet and allergen list, so you can see how it all works. I had read about it and seen a picture of a test, but it makes a whole lot more sense when you see those three components together.

Now I 'm the one who has to go potty!

Cheers,

Anita

---

Parek

 Quote: anitagard

It is not used to test food allergies. .... Once the offending allergens are determined, you either eliminate / limit the dog's exposure from then on, or the vet cooks up a vaccine tailored to those allergens. The vaccine is administered over time and (most of the time) gradually desensitizes the dog's system to those allergens. .....
A. Blood tests for inhalant allergies aren't very reliable - the dermatologist won't even offer one of them because he says it's so bad.

B. Even the skin test isn't totally reliable, but it's the best there is. You just have to be willing to have a funny-looking dog for a little while. And fork over some dough. In my case, the evaluations, tests, shampoos, antihistamines, vaccine, etc will total close to $1,000.

C. There's a genetic component. Unfortunately, GSDs are quite prone to allergies and skin issues. There's even one condition called "German shepherd dog pyoderma" ....

Anita, I feel like standing up and cheering that derm vet. AND you.

This is without a doubt the most accurate and up-to-date recap of the present state of the science of canine allergen ID-ing (and the desensitizing injections, which are also far less than 100% successful) that I have even seen on a forum.

As Anita says, it ain't great, but it IS the absolute best we have for isolating the offending (non-food) allergens.

Thanks, Connie. I was hoping this will help a lot of other people, so I tried to put a lot of effort into it.

Great. On Wednesday I spent $300 on a blood test for my dog. The vet told me that neither skin nor blood test is perfect, but didn't tell me one was better than the other.

Hans has a red spot on his lower abdomen that he licks. He had the same thing in December, which we thought we fixed by getting rid of his cedar stuffed bedding and putting pea gravel over the wood chips in the area he uses for a bathroom. But apparently something else is going on.

Rich