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Free BAER Testing in Denver


Mark Billadeau
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The ABCA Health & Genetics Committee has been working with Dr. Mark Neff on a few DNA studies, one of which is early on set deafness in Border Collies. While Dr. Neff has left UCSF he is continuing these studies at his new position (to be announced). This new position provides funding for furthering his genetic studies including offering sample collection clinics. One of the first clinics he is offering is sponsored by The Mountain Plains Border Collie Association. Here is the flyer for this event; I hope those of you in the area will take advantage of this opportunity to test the hearing of your dog and help in furthering heath studies of our breed.

 

Mark Billadeau

Flyer.pdf

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Wow, Mark, if this happens in our part of the country, let me know. Megan was tested as "normal" at about two years of age but we (and our vet) are quite convinced that she began losing her hearing around age 4 or 5 and is largely deaf now (aged 7).

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We are working on one at the finals this year and another possible one in PA this spring. I will be sure to post more info when I have it.

 

Mark

 

Great news Mark!

 

I would be very interested in bringing my dogs to the one PA (depending on which side of the state it's on). Thanks for the heads up!

 

A friend who attended Dr. Neff's presentation at the Border Collie Specialty in Oct told me that Dr. Neff said he thought they were about six months away from a DNA test. Have you heard any updates? It should be available soon if they are still on target.

 

ETA: I guess six months from October would be April, but that's still pretty soon!

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A friend who attended Dr. Neff's presentation at the Border Collie Specialty in Oct told me that Dr. Neff said he thought they were about six months away from a DNA test. Have you heard any updates? It should be available soon if they are still on target.

 

It makes me sad to post this, but I don't believe that's accurate at all. While the research is ongoing, it was pretty clear from the presentation at Klamath Falls last Sept that a DNA test is still in the unforeseeable future.

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It makes me sad to post this, but I don't believe that's accurate at all. While the research is ongoing, it was pretty clear from the presentation at Klamath Falls last Sept that a DNA test is still in the unforeseeable future.

 

I'll double-check with my friend to see if she remembers exactly what he said. Or perhaps I misunderstood what she meant (thought I thought she was fairly clear). Thanks.

 

ETA, I certainly wouldn't want to mis-inform. I relayed the info because I thought the source (a person who had attended Dr. Neff's presentation) was good. So I'll check back in when I speak with her again.

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My friend just checked in with me and said that Dr. Neff stated that they are close (about six months away, as of Oct 2009) to having a DNA test for adult-onset deafness. When it comes to testing for epilepsy or sound sensitivity, they have a long way to go. I am confident that my friend is savvy enough to have understood the presentation, and also had personal motivation to pay close attention, as she's got a dog with adult onset deafness and another who is epileptic.

 

ETA: She also has a sound sensitive dog as well as a "control" dog and had blood drawn and participated with all four for the study.

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I don't want to seem argumentative, but at the same time I would not like to see this spread around further and false hopes raised, because it simply is not true. As I understand it, a region of interest has been identified on the genome, meriting further study and giving rise to reasonable expectations that the mutation(s) can be identified and a DNA test ultimately developed. Such a test is NOT imminent, much as we all wish it were.

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There may be a bit of confusion here about the definition of "DNA Test". The next step in the process for early on-set deafness is to confirm the markers of interest and develop a focused test for these markers. Then, more testing will be needed to demonstrate that dogs with the markers of this test do in fact develop early on-set deafness. Once we have confirmation that these markers do in fact lead to the disease we will have the final Deafness Test similar to the current CEA test.

 

Of course the focused marker test will be available sooner than the final deafness DNA test.

 

I have asked Dr Neff for his latest estimate on the time frame to when the focused DNA marker test will be available. Currently, there is no way for anyone to know how long it will be until we have the final deafness test like the CEA test

 

Mark

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There may be a bit of confusion here about the definition of "DNA Test". The next step in the process for early on-set deafness is to confirm the markers of interest and develop a focused test for these markers. Then, more testing will be needed to demonstrate that dogs with the markers of this test do in fact develop early on-set deafness. Once we have confirmation that these markers do in fact lead to the disease we will have the final Deafness Test similar to the current CEA test.

 

Of course the focused marker test will be available sooner than the final deafness DNA test.

 

I have asked Dr Neff for his latest estimate on the time frame to when the focused DNA marker test will be available. Currently, there is no way for anyone to know how long it will be until we have the final deafness test like the CEA test

 

Mark

 

Mark, If you will please call me Back

970-227-0137 Nancy Penley

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Hi Eileen,

 

I completely agree that I do not want to spread misinformation, whether it is of a good sort (thus creating false hope) or of a bad sort (people thinking no progress is being made).

 

After my last post I received another email from my friend but had a serious issue to attend to and couldn't follow up here earlier than this evening. My friend emailed me:

He said they were within 4 to 6 months of pinpointing the gene(s) for deafness and developing a DNA test.

 

This says something different to me than "the test will be available in 6 months," and I suspect it means something very much like what Mark suggested. In my opinion, it's easy to see how people--meaning both people who heard Dr. Neff at the Finals, and people who heard him at the other event in October--might think that the test would follow very quickly on the heels of pinpointing the gene.

 

I just wanted to follow up to provide what clarity I could (perhaps I just muddied it a bit instead!).

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Dr. Neff answered my question about how long until the focused test. Currently they are still trying to clearly identify markers they are confident are present in dogs that have gone deaf and not present in dogs that did not. The time to finish this work is highly dependent upon the results of the testing on new DNA samples they are collecting. The impression he gives me is they have the resources for the testing but need the samples. He also gives me the impression that with the right samples and DNA finger printing results they COULD have the markers identified within 4 to 6 months. Right now his research hinges upon sample collection and collecting the right samples (ones from family lines with early adult deafness).

 

This is why he is and will be funding free clinics around the country. The BAER testing will be key for the next step towards having the final early adult deafness test: proving dogs with the "to be identified" markers do develop the disease. This proof will require DNA test results, BAER test results early in life showing no hearing loss, and BAER test results later in life showing hearing loss. If he waits to collect BAER data until the markers have been identified, then the proof will have to wait until the BAER tested dogs reach 4-6 years of age. By collecting the BAER data now he may get lucky in testing dogs right before they start having hearing loss. The best way to improve his luck is to increase the number of dogs being tested AND make sure as many dogs as possible from those family lines that have in the past shown early adult hearing loss are included in this round of testing.

 

Mark

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  • 2 weeks later...
1.5 Days

105 blood Draws

87 BAER tests!!!!!!!!

 

Tired people, Thanks to Elaine, Laura, Lisa, Katie S and Katie P., Dr Neff, Collette Wiliams (the best BAER tester ) and Jovanie( who saved the weekend with her mad Technical skills.......)

 

Thank you Nancy and co. for all your hard work before and during the event. This was the first clinic of several to come and will be used as a guide on how to organize and run the rest.

 

I will post announcements of future clinics when the details are finalized. I can tell you we are looking at several trials around the country before the finals to have one of these clinics and we're working towards having one at the finals.

 

Mark Billadeau

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Thank you Nancy and co. for all your hard work before and during the event. This was the first clinic of several to come and will be used as a guide on how to organize and run the rest.

 

I will post announcements of future clinics when the details are finalized. I can tell you we are looking at several trials around the country before the finals to have one of these clinics and we're working towards having one at the finals.

 

Mark Billadeau

I wonder if you are considering the Bluegrass. With all those entries (140 in Open alone) and all the accompanying dogs that aren't entered, that's a lot of dogs!

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