Nutritional DCM, is it in the UK?

RE: Nutritional DCM, is it in the UK?

Dave Dickson — Fri, 15 Mar 2019 18:59:18 GMT

I think the underlying cause(s) haven't been figured out fully yet. Taurine is only part of the story.

Here's a link to the most up-to-date news on it I've seen: https://avmajournals.avma.org/doi/full/10.2460/javma.253.11.1390

Dave

RE: Nutritional DCM, is it in the UK?

Richard Carter — Fri, 15 Mar 2019 13:08:41 GMT

I thought taurine was present and sourced from red meat? Hence the giving CKCS cat food to supplement so how does a grain free product result in a deficiency?

RE: Nutritional DCM, is it in the UK?

bevs2251 — Thu, 14 Mar 2019 04:23:37 GMT

"Advance Dermcare" linked to several cases of canine megaoesophagus in Australia recently. Haven't seen any DCM cases from grain free diets as yet but, no doubt, we will soon. Popular here also.

RE: Nutritional DCM, is it in the UK?

Dave Dickson — Mon, 11 Mar 2019 19:24:57 GMT

I don't know of much published in the UK - it is largely anecdotal. I have definitely seen a few cases but don't have enough for anything formal yet.

The way I view DCM is that it is a bucket diagnosis - we spot a specific type of appearance on echo and label it DCM, whereas actually what we are seeing is the DCM phenotype on echo and need to look for the underlying cause. In human medicine, the dilated cardiomyopathies fill a couple of pages - we are nowhere near that in VetMed yet, and we need (as a discipline) to look a lot deeper into the underlying causes. Sadly, we rarely find one.

Dave

RE: Nutritional DCM, is it in the UK?

Anthony Dennison — Mon, 11 Mar 2019 16:37:10 GMT

Interesting to read this, as someone used one of these for a case report in the cardiology cert I'm doing. All the literature on it seems to come from North America, but this case was from Scotland.

RE: Nutritional DCM, is it in the UK?

Dave Dickson — Sun, 10 Mar 2019 22:29:58 GMT

Hi Claire

I have seen a few nutritional DCM cases - vegan dogs, dogs on BEG diets and a few taurine-deficient dogs fed on standard diets.

I think the best advice for now is to check taurine concentrations in any "unusual DCM" cases, or those on unusual diets. Grain-free is the current buzzword in vet cardiology but I'm not convinced that the link has been proven - certainly some dogs may be at risk, but I don't think it's as simple as just giving them a grain-free diet. The ongoing research in this area will hopefully yield useful guidelines.

Dave

RE: Nutritional DCM, is it in the UK?

Claire Carney — Thu, 07 Mar 2019 14:19:08 GMT

Pretty much!! turns out dog food appears to be disproving the saying- you get what you pay for.

Some of the reported foods are worldwide brands though which is a massive concern and why I'm curious if it's been seen around the world. The FDA's the only one officially investigating at the moment from what I can see.

I am not sure if I can name the larger brand names implicated on here without it causing issues but they are available on the Facebook site's graph- there more then 200 reported cases on there and some very intersting data building. Its not just small boutique homegrown foods. Though there are case's coming from those as well. It may be the legumes etc but at this stage, it's not certain as there's such a wide variety of foods being implicated.

Its also not ALL taurine deficiency either as some tested with confirmed DCM on these foods are coming back as normal taurine levels....

Several of the dogs have responded and had signs of reversal on Echos once treated and changed to a WSAVA guideline following food brand...including one case study that was published.

There's also several cases of Multiple dogs from different breeds and family lines going down with the same condition- 15 different families with more than one dog so far I believe..

This isn't just the Goldens, though they seem to be highly reported and have a possible genetic link.

I'm a little horrified that so many dogs are being reported and echo'ed....which would suggest we are seeing the tip of the iceberg at the tertiary centers and I wonder what level of subclinical disease is around ...and how many young dog sudden deaths of "unknown causes" with no pm performed may be due to this potentially entirely preventable issue.

https://www.fda.gov/AnimalVeterinary/NewsEvents/CVMUpdates/ucm630991

RE: Nutritional DCM, is it in the UK?

Liz Barton — Thu, 07 Mar 2019 13:56:30 GMT

Had to look up BEG- Boutique, exotic and grain free! So pay more to increase risk

RE: Nutritional DCM, is it in the UK?

Liz Barton — Thu, 07 Mar 2019 13:55:14 GMT

I‘be spoken to a cardiologist at Dick Whites who thinks they’ve seen a few cases linked to grain-free. Interesting in this review paper some of the dogs had normal blood taurine but still showed improvement on diet change and taurine supplementation https://avmajournals.avma.org/doi/pdf/10.2460/javma.253.11.1390