To be fair to vets: outside of the situation with cavaliers, they would likely never see a single case of syringomyelia in an entire working career. And cavaliers are only one breed of all the varieties of dogs they see, and dogs are only one of many animals the average vet will need to be able to treat. On top of that, outside of the UK and Ireland, cavaliers are not a common breed -- many if not most vet practices in the US have probably never had a cavalier client (though that is changing). So to expect vets to be familiar with SM is a very long shot -- they would no more be likely to be able to identify SM in a dog than your GP would be able to identify SM in a human -- there are just many, many other more obvious things that would cause the common symptoms of SM in them and in us. This is why it typically takes at least a year and a half and up to 6 for it to be diagnosed in affected cavaliers, according to Clare Rusbridge's research sample in a recent paper-- and that was the UK, where they are the most common toy breed in the country. SM is really a specialist area needing a specialist diagnosis. But a vet should eliminate all other options first as there are many.
There have been almost no seminars or symposia for vets to attend on this topic anywhere in the world. Unfortunately not too many have attended those in the UK that do exist. Fortunately in Ireland the Irish Vets Journals did a story on SM (I was going to write it but then one of the vets did, which made more sense!) about 10 months ago and that really raised general awareness amongst vets. But reading about it isn't the same as seeing cases. My own vets were very interested to learn more but I can say with a high degree of confidence that I (like most SM dog owners) would recognise a likely SM case a lot faster than my vets ever would. You get to know the typical behaviours and some of them are virtually unmistakeable. My dog owning friends would never, ever notice the symptoms -- they think my SM dogs' scratching is perfectly normal, for example. But from long experience now I (unfortunately) know exactly the quirks of that scratching that makes it NOT normal -- everything from the way they scratch to the frequency to the time when it is most likely to happen (often this is at night, when many owners and breeders do not have their dogs in the room sleeping right next to them in the bed to realise this is even happening. This was when I realised Leo was becoming symptomatic -- for months he only had noticeable, odd scratching in the middle of the night. He would wake me up several times nightly because he was next to me, scratching and scratching
). Also it happens first thing in the morning, and last thing at night. But again this is when owners often let the dog outside for a wee and aren't really watching much and if you have several dogs it is even less noticeable as they mill around. It would be very hard to spot by breeders who often have dogs in completely separate querters, where they are kennelled. It was months before Leo started occasional air scratching in the day -- the unique form of SM scratching that only a fraction of SM dogs do. So it can be hard to identify.
Thus cavalier owners everywhere can do their vets and perhaps another owner and cavalier a big favour by bringing in the downloadable information sheets I have on the
www.smcavalier.com website as this will likely be the only detailed reference material they have seen on the subject.
It is quite sobering to look at the percentages affected with SM in the research samples compiled for the DNA research and the general cavalier pedigree database, noted in the new Rusbridge newsletter I just posted. Of some 600+ MRI'd cases, a large portion, probably the majority of these being general research samples, not dogs people brought in to be MRId with suspect symptoms, *two thirds* have SM. In addition, another 600+ dogs in the sample have clinically diagnosed SM (on the basis of symptoms) or an MRI diagnosis where the dog was excluded from the actual DNA research because not enough info was on the MRI write-up.
That's 1000+ cavaliers diagnosed with SM just within that research compilation. It is obvious that this complex and mysterious condition is going to an increasingly serious concern for owners and breeders.
