Canine Genetic Diseases - Please help me with my vet studies

[Miss Z]

The first part above struck me. Here in the USA, our veterinarians do routine surgeries, but a veterinary surgeon is a specialty with extra training and certifications. They are 2 different professions, if you will. So just thought I'd point that out. I haven't any idea how the terms translate across the pond!

Funnily enough I had often wondered why some people on here use the word "veterinarians" and others used the term I'm more familiar with! All the vets I have worked with, and the line I want to go into, both consult clients directly in open surgery and perform a wide variety of invasive operations, x-rays, etc. This is what about 99.9% of vets in practice do over here. There is just one veterinary medicine degree (although all universities over here have their own slight 'variety', but it is ultimately the same qualification). You become qualified in both large and small animal practice, as well as some knowledge of exotics which you can expand if you so choose.

I did in fact consider applying to an American or Canadian university. It's just so difficult to get a place on a UK veterinary course. It's the most over-subscribed course there is, and with only 7 universities offering the course with about 70 places each (and each candidate is only permitted to apply to four), you can be as keen and as motivated and as intelligent as you like and still get a string of rejections. It's really, really daunting. A lot of the qualified vets I've worked with did not get into university on the first or even second time they applied although I suppose the consolation is they made it in the end. Still, I don't think I'm totally ready to move half-way across the world just yet, and besides I think the DVM is quite distinct from the BVetMed and the likes that I've become accustommed to.

All the information I'm getting here though is really helpful in enriching my knowledge, and hopefully will make the unis sit up and notice me.

PDA heart murmurs: I only know of this through the bichon rescue group newsletters. They have successfully saved 67 bichon babies, with surgery to correct this defect. They will fly a pup cross country to use the vet surgeon who has developed a specific technique for this condition. This shows up in pups prior to 12 weeks old and is fatal if not surgically corrected. The new surgery has 100% success rate! In the past 2 years, 2 pups were not flown to him and had surgery at another facility and both died. So now the rescue insists on getting all the pups to that one surgeon to do the work.

Wow, that's quite some success rate. Do you have any more information on the surgery he is performing? That sounds quite radical and I'm sure would really impress interviewers if I could talk about a development that hasn't even reached this country yet!

Zara -- do you ever see any cases of PRA? They are working on a blood test to dectect it in Belgians. I don't know why it is taking so long, as they have it for some other breeds (like tollers). There are some very nice dogs that I would consider adding to my breeding program, only there are PRA producers in the background. It's such a hard one because you never know if a dog carries it until it produces it -- I could have PRA in my lines and not even know it! What a frightening disease.

Yes, I've seen one definite case and one strongly suspected case, and also a case in a cat, which I think is the same condition. A vet I was working with also said there's some research going on to identify the gene in various terriers as well. I'm not sure why they can't find the gene in certain breeds either, as dog breeds are all the same species and can all, theoretically, breed with each other, so their genetic make-up can't be that different. I should have thought of the question to ask him there and then but was preoccupied with the opthalmoscope looking into the dog's eye!

Thanks to everyone who's shared information, this is really such a great help, and also a really interesting discussion.