PKD TESTING - the emotional cost

By RITA QUICK

Earlier this year, through Viewpoint, I answered a letter written by a lady whose British Shorthair had been diagnosed as having Polycystic kidneys. It transpired that some years previous his breeder had outcrossed to a Persian Longhair and it was felt that the PKD entered the lines from there.

Following my letter the owner of the cat telephoned me. We had a long chat and we agreed to keep in touch, unfortunately I mislaid her phone number and I was very saddened to read in Our Cats 1077, that her cat was coming to the end of his days. It had been her dream to have a British Shorthair as a companion through her September years and in reality this dream had now turned into a nightmare.

I hope that in time this lady can put her emotions aside and realise that both the breeder of her cat and the owner of the stud to which it was outcrossed may not have known that there was a problem in their lines when the mating, that resulted in the birth of her cat, took place. If their cats were healthy and happy they would have had no reason to suspect any problems and if they didn't read publications that made reference to PKD they would have unaware of PKD and its hereditary implications. After all some PKD positive cats live to a good old age without showing any signs.

Emotional cost

Her letter brought to mind something, which is seldom written about - the emotional cost of PKD and PKD testing. At the time I had been putting together some notes for an article for Our Cats on just that subject.

To lose a cat with PKD is very distressing - an emotional time for anyone but breeders who decide to take the scanning/DNA testing route with their cats do so in the knowledge that they have an emotional time ahead of them and possibly some very difficult times as well.

To scan or DNA test for PKD is still very much a personal choice however this may not be so in the future. I have heard that several cat clubs are proposing to seek opinions, at their next AGMs, on whether when kittens are registered the PKD negative certificates for the sire and dam should be supplied.

I first heard of Polycystic Kidney Disease when, some 15 years ago, a kitten bought in partnership with a friend didn't grow as we thought she should and shortly into adulthood she died in her sleep. We had a post mortem carried out and PKD was diagnosed. It was a very emotional time for us; we had such hopes for future breeding plans involving this kitten. We were never advised at that time that PKD was hereditary, in fact we really weren't told much about it at all.

As the years passed articles began to appear in Cat publications and at the same time the number of Persians on the show bench began to decrease and, of course, PKD became a prime topic of conversation “you know, so and so had all her cats scanned, all positive, she's given up now”. I heard these words or similar so many times and felt so sad and wondered how I would feel if this ever happened to me. To have years of building up ones breeding lines and establishing pedigrees, all ended because of positive PKD results, the emotional distress is hard to imagine.

Many people who have had kittens from me over the years keep in touch and I have never had any reason to think that any of my cats were PKD positive so it was with mixed emotions that I made my first appointment for PKD scanning at Langford. The big problem was that I was breeding a less popular line, Persian Brown Tabbies, for which the gene pool was very small.I was going to have two cats scanned and I didn't sleep the night before. On the day a friend accompanied me and whilst driving to Langford I thought to myself why had I asked that particular friend to come with me – if my two cats were PKD positive, then the cats she had had from me would more than likely be positive too.

Scanning necessary

Fortunately both cats were negative and feeling emotionally drained from the experience we stopped at a local hostelry and boosted our spirits with a shandy and a packet of crisps. Whilst enjoying this break we both decided that PKD scanning for all of our cats was now necessary.

We were advised that an Ultrasonographer did home visits if there were enough cats to make her visit viable. We made the necessary appointment and got together with a number of breeders who agreed to bring their cats to my home for scanning.

It was a day I shall never forget, and one that I would never want to live through again.

Yes, there were a number of negative results, I only had one positive amongst my cats - I was the fortunate one.

Upset

One breeder came along with cats she had imported - they had been imported with copies of negative certificates for their sire and dam but the cats scanned that day were positive. The breeder, so upset that she could barely speak, drove away with tears in her eyes. Her searching for cats to improve her breeding lines, her elation at finding them, her time and money spent in getting those cats to England, her plans for the future with these cats would never be fulfilled.

One friend arrived with half of her cats; she had mixed results and then went home to collect the rest of her cats. Again mixed results and she drove away devastated knowing that she was faced with the neutering of a breeding line she had so carefully been working on. Her oldest breeding queen was positive - she had kept three generations of females from this queen, all scanned positive. Their sire was negative and she had hoped that at least one of the females would be negative too so that she could continue from there. She later telephoned the breeder of her foundation queen only to be met with a great deal of abuse. She made the call because she thought that person would like to know about the results, not to lay any blame, and the reaction was not the emotional response and support that she had anticipated.

A very emotional day, the buffet lunch that I had prepared remained uneaten. The day was followed by more emotions as we had our positive cats neutered and started to pick up the pieces and the hopes that we could re-establish our breeding programmes with negative lines.

My one positive cat had not come to me from his Breeder - I had bought him from someone who had given up cat breeding but I felt the need to advise his breeder and wrote to her. Her response “I know where he CAUGHT that“. I realised then that people only knew about PKD and understood about it if they had actually had experience of it or had read about it.

On that awful day I vowed that any future scanning would be done at Langford and I would not take another breeder with me. Fortunately cats taken to Langford since that day have all been negative.

Langford ran a programme for a number of cats whereby the scanning was done free of charge if owners agreed to return for a rescan a year later. I entered one female into these scheme and both her scans were negative. They told me that day that everyone who had returned had had the same result the second time around up to that date. DNA testing has now made it easier to keep ones emotions to oneself - the vet takes the swab, sends it to Langford, the results are faxed or posted back to the vet and the vet then telephones the owner with the results. If the results are not good no-one outside sees the subsequent tears that are shed.

Anticipation

Earlier this year whilst at a show I saw a kitten whose looks I felt would enhance my lines, yes, the kitten would be available for sale, no, the breeder had not PKD tested but was about to start DNA tests the next week. How I waited, excited in anticipation of being able to own this lovely kitten - each time I opened my E-mails I held my breath, hoping to hear from the breeder. First came the news, not good with the parents but having the kitten tested. Then finally the E-mail to say that the kitten wouldn't be coming to join us. Yes, it was an emotional time for me, but for the breeder it must have been devastating.

A high percentage of Persian Longhair breeders have taken the PKD testing route, for many it has been traumatic. They have done it in the hopes that PKD can be eradicated in the future but will it totally disappear from our lines is a question I ask. One only has to watch programmes on TV or read articles in the Press to realise that rare genetic disorders can suddenly occur after many, many generations. I only hope that we have not gone down this emotionally charged route for PKD to sadly re-appear.

I have written several articles for various publications about scanning for PKD (Polycystic Kidney Disease) - one such article is headed up “To scan, or not to scan, that is the question”. If any of you have read these articles you will know that I say what I have written is purely my own opinion and likewise applies to this.

PKD, my cats and the cat fancy -

a personal experience by Marianne Brett

I started breeding Persian cats in 1989, and five years later added Exotics as a second and complimentary breed. Although I have bred a few titled cats, including some that were sold as kittens, most of my kittens tend to go to pet homes. As such I have always found it extremely important to ensure the health of my cats is as good as possible, as the health of a single cat will often matter a lot more to the pet owner than to breeders and exhibitors.

Yes we all (hopefully) care deeply for our cats and usually have our spoilt favourites, but the situation of a multi cat household cannot really be compared to that of the person with a single pet. I have always prided myself on taking all possible steps to breed only cats that are as healthy a possible, and that are reared indoors as part of the family, so that they easily can settle into pet homes where they can be much loved companions for years to come.

However I fully admit to burying my head in the sand when I initially heard the term Polycystic Kidney Disease mentioned. PKD, wasn't that some disease that only occurred in America and in their Persians? I read stories on the internet, and those told of cats that died young, sometimes even as young kittens. My cats were not dying young, and certainly not as kittens, so I convinced myself that I did not have a problem. UK breeders that tested for PKD were few and far between, and when I asked my vet about PKD, he seemed to know very little about it. I asked several breeder friends, and most were of the opinion that there was no reason to test. So I promptly forgot about it for the next few years.

In 2002 however I started to notice that more and more of the kitten enquiries that I receive almost daily started to mention PKD testing. Were my cats tested? Most of these enquiries came from average people on the lookout for a pet kitten, not from breeders, and it transpired that they all had read about PKD in various cat magazines. I started to realise that eventually anybody would find it hard, if not impossible, to sell Persian kittens as pets unless we had proof of the parents having tested negative for PKD, and so I started to look in to the possibility of having my cats tested.

I soon gave up on the notion. There were at that time only ten veterinary centres in the UK that carried out FAB approved PKD scanning, and not one of them was located in Yorkshire where I live, or any of the neighbouring counties Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire or Derbyshire. The prices quoted for scanning were also high, and each cat had to be microchipped before being scanned. I calculated and realised that it would cost me many hundreds of pounds to have my cats tested. So once again I reassured myself with the fact that I did not have cats that died young, and indeed I had several elderly cats that still were healthy. PKD could not be in my lines.

Then I was contacted by a new Exotic breeder who was interested in buying a male kitten as a future stud. Divina Bates of Ingucheeni Exotics asked if I had had my cats PKD tested. I had a pregnant queen at the time, an importedChampion, and I knew that she had been tested in Sweden before I bought her, and I had been told that she was negative. I did however not have any paperwork to prove this. I told Dee this, and also gave her the usual reassurances of how my cats are not dying young from kidney problems. Dee bought a male kitten from me, Blondbella Hotpick “Zipeau”, a Blue Tabby Exotic, and I kept his litter brother as a future stud.

Dee and I became friends, and as a new breeder she wanted to ensure that she only bred from the best possible cats and did not bring in any problems to her breeding programme. She soon convinced me to start PKD testing my cats even though neither of us really believed there was a problem. Today I am very thankful for this – thank you Dee.

I went on a course to learn to microchip so that we could cut the cost down of having this done, and we then booked the first appointment to have some cats scanned at Cambridge Vet University. We simply would not be able to have all cats tested at once due to the cost, but decided to do them in a few batches – and to take it in turns to undertake the long drive to Cambridge and back, taking each others cats as well as our own.

I don't think I have ever been so nervous as during those times when I was waiting for results as to my cats PKD status. For the first trip, I waited at home whilst Dee's partner went down to Cambridge. I had sent one of my studs, a queen who had yet to be bred from, and Dee had taken several of her cats, including three that I had bred.

Relief

Both my cats turned out to be negative, and the relief was immense. However that relief soon turned into panic when two of the three cats I had bred tested positive – including a stud who I myself had used at stud several times. The answer was now staring me in the face: I DID have PKD in my lines!

With hindsight, I was possibly correct in believing that my original cats were PKD free, as I did have some very long lived cats. Indeed at home today I have an almost 15-year-old Persian, as well as my foundation Exotic queen who now is twelve-and-a-half years old. Both are healthy. But what breeder goes though life without ever having to buy in new blood? I had done exactly this a few years ago, and the positive cats could be directly traced back to some of them.

Dee and I discussed all possibilities, especially the FAB's advice that no breeder should panic and automatically neuter all their positive cats, as this could well lead to entire lines vanishing, and the gene pool becoming small. However we both believed, and still do, that as PKD can easily be eradicated in one single generations -negative parents only being able to give rise to negative kittens – it is not right to deliberately breed from positive parents as some of the kittens WILL be affected, and what do you do then? Sell them as pets knowing they may have a short lifespan, or keep them?

Neither option is ideal. At this time, of course, the DNA test was not yet available and cats had to be at least ten-months-old before they could be accurately scanned.

We soon took another trip to Cambridge with a car packed full of cats to be scanned. And it was devastating news. Although most of the queens I had tested turned out to be negative, all but one of my stud boys were positive. A Cream Point Colourpoint female it had taken me 12 years to breed tested positive, and I was told by the vet that her kidneys were so badly affected she would have a very short life indeed. The male kitten I had kept from my imported queen was positive. Dee's Zipeau however was thankfully negative, as was the mother –as expected. It was the stud I had used who was positive, and indeed as it turned out, with a few exceptions, almost all matings I had done for the past few years had been from a negative queen to a positive stud.

Everything positive was neutered immediately.

The next trip to Cambridge was wonderful as all four cats that I brought turned out to be negative. The final trip however brought the opposite result: all the cats I brought were positive.

At the end of all the testing, I found myself with one Persian stud (no Exotic, although I was able to use Zipeau) and seven queens (both breeds) who were negative. This may sound like an altogether good result, plenty of cats to breed from, but alas it turned out not to be as easy as this.

Once the testing was complete, nothing seemed to go right any more. My one stud either has a very low sperm count or a very low sexual drive, as I soon found that he failed to get most queens pregnant. To date I have only had two live litters born to him. Of those two, one queen was kept who turned out to be infertile herself, and the other one consisted of a single kitten who was sold as a pet. One queen aborted twice and had to be neutered, so that was one negative cat gone from my breeding programme. The others simply never got pregnant to him, not even those that were proven with other studs in the past (studs who had turned out to be positive).

I mated my import queen to her own son Zipeau to preserve that line, and have kept a female from that. I then mated her up one final time in the hope of getting a male kitten to keep (there had been none available in the previous litter) and tragically she died during the pregnancy. Two queens gone.

My only negative Colourpoint queen developed FIP and died. There were now three negative queens gone.

Of the remaining ones, only ONE has managed to get pregnant. This girl is an Exotic. As such I soon found myself in danger of losing my Persian lines, as of course I cannot breed Persians from Exotics. Two of my LilacCream Persians have consistently failed to get pregnant to my Persian boy –one of them is proven, the other not. My LilacCream Champion, the best cat I have ever bred and one of my most special favourite pet cats as well, is simply refusing to be mated. The Persian boy is gentle and she will simply refuse him anywhere near her. He is too soft to persist, and simply does not seem interested enough.

Zipeau the Exotic is also a gentle boy (now having been given back to me by Dee), and he to has failed to get this girl pregnant. Yet all of these cats are proven – but this queen is spoilt and difficult and needs a VERY firm stud who will take no nonsense. I have no such stud. I also have a Cream Persian girl, another of my spoilt brats, who now is the last one of an important part of my line, and she is exactly the same. Proven but refuses to mate. (Needless to say, the previous kittens were positive, due to the studs being positive.)

I was given a lovely Exotic by Dee, completely new lines to me, all import, and she too has failed to ever conceive although she has by now been mated several times.

And so unless I can get the three Persian girls pregnant, all I am left with is the one Exotic queen. She has recently had a litter, nothing spectacular but it gave me two females to keep back of colours that I want to work with. That the type and colour is awful is something I will just have to address later – at least the kittens are healthy, negative, short coated and of the right colours.

I am now on the very brink of losing my Persian line that I have worked so hard for, over so many years. My first love.

Heartbreaking

During 2005 alone, I have had no less than seven cats die. Most of these died from PKD, some as young a only a year or two of age. I have learned first hand that cats DO die of PKD, and they do not all go on for years as some breeders claim, some do die young. There is nothing more heartbreaking than having to watch a young cat die of an incurable illness. Personally I will never now understand those few breeders that remain that do not test.

There are cats out there, some of hem top show winners, often pictured on these pages, that remain untested, yet sire litter after litter after litter. Several of the resulting kittens do end up being tested as positive, and without both parents having been tested, there is no way of knowing which parent is responsible. I have actually heard owners of some of these cats claim that they will not PKD test as they are afraid of the result -afraid that their top winning Grands will be positive and have to be neutered.

But shouldn't those breeders be even MORE afraid of producing kitten after kitten after kitten that may end up dying aged one, or two, or three, possibly having produced MORE affected kittens before showing symptoms, or braking the heart of their owners who bought them as pets? Is there really ANY excuse not to test, especially now when there is a simple DNA test available, so that all that is needed is a trip to your own vet and not a trek half way across the country? Please do not make the same mistakes I did and believe you are safe – YOU ARE NOT. Nobody is.

The only way to eradicate PKD is to test, and to only breed from negative cats. And I have t say, it is a wonderful feeling to be contacted by a pet buyer telling a tale of how their beloved pet died of kidney problems aged three, and be able to assure them that the kittens you have for sale are from parents that have tested negative, and any buyer will receive copies of their test results to prove it. (And along those lines, I believe the GCCF should take a leaf out of the Kennel Club's book, and print relevant official test results on the cats' registration certificates. This need not mean that all cats HAD to be tested, just that where there ARE available official results, it would be very useful both for breeders and pet owners to have these printed on all registration certificates.)

So, here I was, with only one Exotic stud, and a total of six negative queens, only one of which is breeding. My LilacCream Champion is over five and has never given birth naturally, her only (positive) litter was born by caesarean, and my one remaining Cream Persian from my original Persian line is approaching five.

I am desperate for kittens to keep back to continue my lines. After 16 years I can't face the thought of starting all over again, so if I lose my lines I will simply give up breeding. As has already been mentioned, I believe that the Cream and the LilacCream queen would be able to get pregnant if they went to a forceful stud, as they have done in the past. But I have no such stud. And so I started to approach other breeders.

Wonder

And this is where I am starting to wonder what has happened to our cat fancy in the past few years. When I started, breeders helped each other out, going out to stud was not a problem, and kittens were being sold for breeding to responsible breeders without the buyer needing to take out a second mortgage.

Yes, after a bad experience many years ago I have kept my own studs private only, but I have always been willing to help out any fellow breeder who was in need, and I would gladly allow my boys to mate another breeder's queens if that breeder was in dire need. Yet I have approached numerous breeders about the possibility of taking one or two of my Persian queens out to stud, and the answer has been no, every single time. Yes the Cream isn't show quality as such, she has her (minor) faults, but she has valuable lines behind her and she is negative.

The LilacCream is a Champion with six CC's and ten BOBs behind her-under nine different judges, often having been described as the best LilacCream Persian the judge has seen. I myself am no newcomer to the cat fancy. Yet the answer has been no. Nobody will allow their studs to mate my queens, to help me out. Although I am working with Chocolates and Lilacs, I was perfectly willing to go to any colour stud to preserve the lines, as long as he himself was negative and of reasonable quality.

And all I got was a flat no everywhere. What ever happened to breeders helping each other? This is not the cat fancy I know. So many of the Persian (and Exotic) breeders of the past seems to have given up and in their place we have large numbers of relative newcomers, all apparently with their own set of rules? Rules that say each breeder stick to themselves?

New stud

Next I tried to buy in a new stud. This would have been possible, had it not been for the prices charged nowadays for breeding cats. Personally I would think that £600 for a show quality cat for breeding would be perfectly acceptable (had I had some time to save up), but £900 or more for a male for breeding, that even may have a fault making him unsuitable for showing? Or four figures for a show quality male. Males that all come complete with contracts stating they cannot mate any queen not belonging to me, so that I in my turn would be unable to help other trusted breeders out, should I wish to. I'm sorry, but I am not prepared to buy a cat under such circumstances. Not at those prices. I can afford to look after my cats, they are all fed high quality premium foods, they are seen by a vet whenever needed, and I would like to think they lack for nothing. But I am not well off and simply cannot afford four figure prices for cats – not unless I had a year or two to save up, and TIME is one luxury I do now not have.

One breeder who turned out to be of the old kind, the way I knew them years back, is June Lewis of Khabaqui Persians and Exotics. June very kindly sold me a male Persian kitten of excellent pedigree at what I consider to be a very fair price, and I am very happy with him indeed. He is however still very young, only just having reached nine months, and as yet has not understood what girls are for. I believe it will be a few months yet before he starts to work. Once he does, hopefully all my problems will be solved.

In the meantime, I still have some positive cats left, cats that are on borrowed time. I have calling queens that call for weeks on end without a break, which is not good for them. I have not attended a cat show for many months due to having nothing worthwhile to show (even having missed the Supreme due to my entry having had some fur pulled off her neck by a neuter as she was on one of her long calls), and I have absolutely no kittens in sight.

So the message I would like to give to ALL breeders here is; DO test your cats for PKD and please re-think this seemingly new way of staying in your own corner – do consider helping others out now and then. I know I would be happy to, if ever I will be able to again.

Marianne Brett,
Blondbella Persians & Exotics