Cocker cardiomyopathy

RE: Cocker cardiomyopathy

Dave Dickson — Thu, 19 Sep 2019 14:58:12 GMT

Not that I know of - I think we will learn more in the coming months on this, but right now I still think it is uncommon. I don't think it is solely due to taurine concentration in the food, possibly more to do with bioavailability due to other ingredients (such as lentils).

Dave

RE: Cocker cardiomyopathy

Anthony Dennison — Fri, 13 Sep 2019 12:39:47 GMT

[quote user="roger wilkinson"]aurine definitely yes. not much to lose (only ££) and good chance of some improvement in systolic function in my experience. I always just get practice to order from wholesalers; can't say I know a lot about relative merits of different brands. 500mg bid for a cocker.[/quote]

From what I've read, it's only been seen in dogs on grain free diets or other posh brands that have been shown to be deficient in taurine. Is it more extensive than this?

RE: Cocker cardiomyopathy

Dave Dickson — Wed, 11 Sep 2019 23:19:04 GMT

Hi Alan

No harm in trying taurine - it's cheap and safe. Of limited use in most cases but can't hurt and occasionally you do seem to see improvement. The link between whole blood concentrations, tissue concentrations and response to supplementation does not seem to be clear cut - some with low concentrations don't respond, some with normal concentrations do. Odd.

I don't use carnitine FWIW.

I don't agree with the 6m max thing though - if you look at the published data (e.g. Virginia Luis Fuentes' early paper on pimo in Cockers and Dobies, Mike Martin's DCM papers) then you'll notice that Cockers can live years with DCM. Unpubished work by Paul Wotton also found this. So I think we can be a little more optimistic than David Mills! And I'm never quite sure what "true" DCM is. Perhaps a topic for another discussion...

Dave

RE: Cocker cardiomyopathy

David Mills — Tue, 10 Sep 2019 23:47:27 GMT

Check diet. Almost all commercial diets sufficient.

Otherwise pimobendan.

Acei have some survival benefits in different breeds preclin.

If it's true dcm, then it's 6m max.

As people say in the Cardiology world, the drugs may be expensive but the animals aren't on them for long. Throw everything at it.

RE: Cocker cardiomyopathy

Roger Wilkinson — Tue, 10 Sep 2019 15:45:57 GMT

Hi Alan,

taurine definitely yes. not much to lose (only ££) and good chance of some improvement in systolic function in my experience. I always just get practice to order from wholesalers; can't say I know a lot about relative merits of different brands. 500mg bid for a cocker.

carnitine....not nearly so much evidence and I usually don't supplement as default.

'DCM' phenotype includes things like 'boutique diet cardiomyopathy', tachycardia/bradycardia-induced cardiomyopathy, hypothyroidism etc. Just make sure they are feeding a mainstream diet and worth running T4 and TSH.

I would spend money on that rather than ACEi or spironolactone for which evidence of benefit is not entirely convincing (if you are currently doing quadruple therapy).

best wishes

Roger