Long post warning.
Iβve put off writing this here for a long time but this was one of my first large social media audiences and you all have been so kind and involved in my journey. I am writing about it here because everyone who is looking at getting a borzoi should be aware of this.
TW: pet death
On April 18th, exactly one year after I brought Selkie home from Texas, I found her dead in my yard, what we call βsudden deathβ. 13 days prior, her sire passed away from sudden death as well. He was nearing 6 years of age. Selkie was 14 months old. I donβt have it in me to write it all out, all over again, but I did make a blog post about it on my website here.
Sudden death is something that can affect different breeds but looks different from one breed to the next. In borzoi, we are looking at fatal cardiac arrhythmias. One moment they are with us and then, just as the name describes, they are suddenly gone. Because this is an electrical issue in the heart, necropsies often look completely normal. A normal necropsy is the hallmark of borzoi sudden death. Selkie and her sireβs necropsies looked normal.
Unfortunately we donβt have a way to differentiate the arrhythmias that borzoi can survive, from the ones that are fatal. We know this is genetic, but we donβt have a genetic test for it. We can do 24 hour holter monitors to see a snap shot in that moment of whether a dog is having arrhythmias or not. But, a dog can have 0 abnormalities during that 24 hours and then several in the next day, weeks, months, years. There are dogs that have hundreds of arrhythmias in 24 hours and live normal lives. There are dogs that have 1 or 2 and then drop dead the next day. It sucks. Itβs horribly traumatic for everyone who loves the dog. The silver lining is that it is a very quick way for them to go. There are anti arrhythmic drugs that can reduce arrhythmias and thatβs something that can be discussed with a cardiologist.
Holter tests arenβt part of the required CHIC testing for the breed, but I strongly encourage anyone who is thinking about getting a borzoi to ask every breeder:
How many holters has the breeding pair had (I personally will be doing at least 3 before making breeding decisions).
Ask the breeder to SEE the results. An absolutely ideal holter has zero singles, pairs, runs, complexities. Anything over 10 VPCs makes me squirm. Over 50 is considered abnormal per the large breed guidelines.
Where has sudden death occurred in the pedigree
Prospective borzoi owners asking this of their breeders is likely the best possible way to encourage more breeders to do this.
If you own a borzoi and you want to holter test them, there are a few reduced cost options. Members of the Borzoi Club of America can rent a holterβ info here. Any borzoi owner can rent a holter from the Borzoi Health and Welfare Foundationβ info here. If you want to purchase your own holter monitor, you can do so through alba medical.
We have 3 cardiac studies in the works to try to somehow get a handle on this thing. The borzoi club of america has a holter study. Texas A&M University has an echocardiogram study. And Dr. Kelly at Penn State is studying the hearts of dogs who had sudden death. Because we now have a direct line from sire to daughter of sudden death submitted to the study, including lung samples for gene sequencing, we may be a bit closer to getting a handle on the genetics behind this.
And as I mentioned in my linked blog post above this is not yet so prevalent that owners should expect their dogs to die of sudden death. Which is why itβs so important for the community to be proactive, now. Before it becomes unavoidable. Iβm writing all of this not to scare people out of the breed, and I truly hope I donβt. But I do want everyone to be aware of this if they are considering a borzoi. I would be in a much darker place if I didnβt know what I was looking at when I found Selkie in my yard.
