Dysplasia is a word that comes from the Greek. Dis: deficient and Plasia: formation or development.
It is a disease that mainly affects the greater size Swiss Bouviers. It is a pathology that affects to the coxo-femoral joint (joint of hip and femur) producing a severe damage in this joint. It is of degenerative character.
Many causes can cause dysplasia: hereditary ( the one that is transmitted from parents to children), excessive growth (if the puppy grows very fast will have more probabilities to suffer this disease), malformations (defect in the bones or muscles in the hip region) and feeding (excessively caloric diets or lack of vitamins).
The diagnosis of this disease is obtained by a radiological exam.
The recommended age to test this to our puppies is from 12 months to 15 months just because the joint is already developed. It is not recommendable for our puppies to do intense exercises before this age, since it could negatively affect the development of the joint.
In slight cases of dysplasia surgery is not necessary. The treatment usually consists of the administration of analgesics as well as in restricting the exercises to the affected dog.
In cases of greater gravity usually it is used a surgery treatment, always when the veterinarian considers necessary.
Gastric torsion
The syndrome of stomach expansion-torsion; it is an acute disease of very serious prognosis and that must be dealt with urgency, just because it can end the life of the dog in a matter of hours. Its rate of mortality is very elevated ( treated dogs in time on the thirty or forty percent, and not treated ones in the one hundred percent).
Although the causes are not completely clarified; the extended theory is that due to the gas accumulation the stomach dilates until a point in which the ligaments that fix it not hold and the weight of spleen, located patch to the stomach, produces the turn of the intestine. This causes a collapse in the sanguineous irrigation, since the arteries and veins that run by the stomach strangle, preventing that the blood arrives at other vital organs, that the blood is oxygenated correctly and producing arrhythmias cardiac; deriving finally in a shock of fatal consequences.
Although any dog, without concerning size or race, can undergo it, the breeds prone to suffer this disease are those with deep chest and relaxed stomach and big size breeds.
Although we can´t find the exact causes, we know there are several factors that affect their appearance; abundant meals and in a single time, eating too much quickly, drinking abundantly and eating before and after practicing exercise, stress situations during the feeding. It also seems to exist a genetic predisposition.
The symptoms that usually present/display are:
The dog is anxious and habitually he watches his stomach or the ground.
It has pain and inflammation in the abdominal zone, if the zone with the hand is struck sounded like a drum.
It tries to vomit and, or it cannot, it salivates a lot.
The best medicine is the prevention, reason why it is recommended:
To give the food at least in two daily rations.
Avoid exercise before and after the meals.
Avoid stress situations during the meals.
To use a great size food to force the dog to chew it.
To control the water ingestion after the food.
Not to leave the food to disposition of the animal.
And mainly; when we have the suspicion, to go urgently to the veterinarian; the sooner we go greater the possibilities will be of surviving for our pet.
