Yorkies have an increased risk of being born with liver shunts, and the incidence is high in this breed compared to most other breeds, therefore yorkies are prone to liver shunt.
To be sure that you are buying a healthy puppy, you should NEVER buy a puppy from a breeder who does not test the pups for liver shunt. NEVER buy a puppy without seeing the results of it's SERUM BILE ACID TEST. You should get a copy of the test results when you buy your puppy. This test should be done between 9 and 12 weeks, ideally at 10 weeks of age. There should be 2 sets of results. The 12 hour "fasting" result, and then the second result that is done 2 hours after the puppy has eaten. Both readings should be under 25, and it is normal for the second reading to be a little higher than the first, but still below 25. At the age of 9 to 12 weeks, a serum bile acid test result reading of 50 to 100 is indicative of the hereditary form of liver shunt. I would hesitate to buy a pup without this test. If the test results fall below 25, your pup is free of the hereditary form of this disease, but it does not necessarily mean that it is not a carrier.
Many breeders will try to tell you that "I don't need to test, I have never had a puppy with liver shunt in my lines", or "My dogs are healthy". These are just excuses, and not very good ones at that! No breeder can tell by looking at their dogs. Just because the parents of your puppy do not actually have Liver Shunt, it does not mean that they are not carries of this deadly disease, and it is possible that they can produce a puppy with it. It can pop up in any line of yorkies, at any time. There is no guarantee that your pup will be free of the HEREDITARY form of this disease, unless you have a blood test.
AVOID A BREEDER IF THEY DO NOT TEST THEIR PUPPIES.
I can not think of a single reason that an ethical breeder would not do this test. It does not cost that much money for each test, and the peace of mind just knowing that your pups are healthy, and free of the hereditary form of this disease is well worth any amount of money spent.
I ADMIT THAT I DO NOT KNOW EVERYTHING THAT THERE IS TO KNOW ABOUT YORKIES,
BUT I DO KNOW RIGHT FROM WRONG.....
The following information on this page was taken from Dr. Karen Tobias, DVM, MS, Diplomate ACVS.
The symptoms of liver shunt can start to appear at almost any age. Dogs with a liver shunt are usually very thin dogs that pick at food. They not only have a poor appetite but they can become lethargic, dizzy, and stagger. They may try to climb out of their pen, climb higher on you, and cry and throw their head far back after eating, and they may go into convulsions.
Many breeders feel that it is an inherited disease and that the only way to eliminate that disease is to cull those dogs that are affected and producing this disease from their breeding program. SO FAR, IT HAS NOT BEEN PROVEN THAT THIS IS INDEED A HEREDITARY DISEASE, but it will probably be proven with the DNA studies that are being done right now. If a puppy has a test score that says it is free of liver shunt, it will never develop the hereditary type, but ANY YORKIE can develop an acquired liver shunt due to poor diet, high protein diet, stress, and other factors.
There are studies being done at this very moment, and they are on the verge of finding the DNA marker that will be able to test both sire and dam BEFORE they are bred, and this should go a long way in terminating this horrible disease.
Many toy breeds are affected, but yorkies, in the United States, have almost a 36 times greater risk of developing shunts than all other breeds combined!
The other breeds where liver shunt is a problem are: Low Chen, Schnauzers, Cairn Terriers, Maltese, Dachshunds, Cocker Spaniels, Jack Russel Terriers, Shih-Tzu, Lhasa-Apso, and Poodles.
In other words, if their liver is so damaged that they form shunts (like people with alcoholism and cirrhosis), it usually remains damaged. Some shunts may get smaller as the liver swelling goes down. Many veterinarians only guess that a shunt is there based on blood work changes. We have seen several older dogs that have congenital shunts that are fine unless they get another illness; then the problem of the shunt shows up. Once the other illness resolves, the shunt may not cause noticeable problems (at least, the owners may not detect them).
There is a big debate as to whether liver shunts are hereditary. A disease is likely to be hereditary if it occurs more commonly in one breed than others, if it occurs in a family of dogs, or if it or a closely related disease is proven hereditary in other breeds or species.
To date, liver shunts are considered to be hereditary in Irish Wolfhounds, Cocker Spaniels, Maltese, and Yorkshire Terriers, and are probably hereditary in several other breeds. The affected dog should be castrated or spayed and, because of the mode of inheritance is not known, it is best to avoid breeding the parents of the affected dog.
Do all dogs with shunts have
high bile acid results?
Dogs with shunts will
almost always have high bile acids 2 hours after eating, and at least 95% of
dogs will have high bile acids after a 12 hours fast. For the most accurate test
results, samples are taken after a 12 hour fast, and then repeated 2 hours
after feeding. This is done for several reasons. Some dogs normally release bile
acids in the middle of the night, and therefore would have a higher fasting
result. Other dogs may have fat in their blood after eating, which could
interfere with the results. If only one sample can be obtained, it is best to
take it 2 hours after feeding.
Do all dogs with high bile
acids have shunts?
Bile acids can be
increased with any liver disease. Bile acids can also be mildly increased in
normal dogs, particularly in some breeds (such as the Maltese) where chemicals
that naturally occur in their blood interfere with the test.
Most dogs with liver shunts have
after feeding results of well over 100
(normal is 15-20). If the bile acids are only slightly increased, the vet may
want to re run the test in 3 to 4 weeks.
Treatment
This disease usually goes hand in hand with a kidney disorder and it seems that
a special diet can sometimes keep it under control with some dogs for a time.
Surgery sometimes works depending on where the "shunt" is, and how large it is.
Ameroid constrictor surgery is now being done on some LS victims, with a very
high success rate. If your dog has been diagnosed with high bile acids, I would
advise you to contact Dr. Karen Tobias for a referral.
For more information on this subject, please refer to:
Dr. Karen Tobias,
DVM, MS, Diplomate ACVS
Professor, Small Animal Surgery
University of Tennessee College of Veterinary Medicine
Regent, American College of Veterinary Surgeons
President, Society of Veterinary Soft Tissue Surgery
University of Tennessee College of Veterinary Medicine
University Phone
(865)974-8387
FAX (865) 974-5554
http://www.vet.utk.edu/clinical/sacs/shunt/faq.shtml
MARCH 26, 2005 ... Today, Terri Shumsky passed away.
There are some that may not have heard of Terri Shumsky, as you may be new to the Yorkie world. I feel that you should know of the gift the world was given in Terri. So here's just a few words of the goodness that Terri had brought to this earth! She helped so many, and her memory should live on in every Yorkie Lover on earth. She is gone BUT NOT FORGOTTEN!
In my opinion, Terri is the patron saint of yorkies, and all furry victims of liver shunt.
Her Mission is to Save Dogs with a Rare Disease
San Luis Obispo Tribune, April 12, 2004
by Adam Jarman
Five years after Debbie Hammond's 19-year-old son died in an car wreck, she was spending most of her time at home grieving -- alone, fighting off panic attacks. To give her company and something else to think about, her two other children bought Lexie, a Yorkshire terrier puppy in 2002. But Hammond, of Columbus, Ind., soon felt she was about to lose her new lapdog companion. Lexie wouldn't eat and seemed confused. "I didn't know what was wrong," she explained. "I was terrified she wasn't going to live." After seeing four veterinarians, Hammond learned Lexie had liver shunt, a genetic disorder that doesn't allow blood to be cleaned by the liver.
She then searched the Internet for liver shunt and located Terri Shumsky, a Paso Robles woman who founded a nationwide organization to help those who can't afford liver shunt surgery, which can cost from $1,200 to $3,000. Within a few weeks, Shumsky had scheduled corrective surgery for Lexie at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. "All I had to do was get myself and Lexie there," Hammond said. The Terri Shumsky Fanny Mae Liver Shunt Fund has provided financial assistance to about 30 Yorkie owners like Hammond. "When (Lexie) got to feeling better, she was like a whole new dog," Hammond said. "Without that fund, our dog would be dead. She wouldn't have lived." That's the point of the fund, Shumsky said during a recent interview at her Paso Robles home. There, she lives with her husband John and Honey, the couple's 3-year-old Yorkie and liver shunt survivor. "When you can have this corrective surgery and the dog's going to live a normal life, why not?" she said. "They're like a member of the family." Shumsky, a former breeder, knows first-hand how difficult it is to lose a puppy to liver shunt. In 1986, her puppy Fanny Mae became ill. Shumsky couldn't find a veterinarian who could diagnose the ailment, so Fanny Mae was put to sleep. "Nobody knew what it was," she recalled. "It was awful." An autopsy showed the puppy had liver shunt. Shumsky later met another dog owner whose puppy showed similar symptoms to Fanny Mae. Shumsky suggested the dog be tested for liver shunt. The test came back positive and Shumsky led an online effort to help pay for the surgery.
That was five years ago. Since then, Shumsky and her organization have raised more than $46,000 through donations, fund-raisers and online auctions for things like Shumsky's handmade, life-sized ceramic Yorkies covered in authentic hair.
One such "hairamic" fetched $5,000.
But the organization does more than pay for surgeries, said Karen Tobias, a veterinary surgeon and professor at the University of Tennessee. "The most incredible thing her group has done is educated thousands and thousands of owners and breeders and veterinarians ... of the fact their puppies could be sick," she said. Dr. Tobias has been researching liver shunt since 1986 and hopes to someday find a way to prevent it. In the meantime, Terri Shumsky and her committee of more than 15 Yorkie owners from around North America will continue to save one dog at a time. "That woman must have the biggest heart," said Hammond, whose Lexie received surgery a year and a half ago, "because she didn't know me from the Man in the Moon and started helping me. I'm amazed that there are people like her in the world."