The German Wirehaired Pointer / Deutsch Drahthaar can suffer from a bleeding disorder, often fatal, called Von Willebrands Disease (or vWD for short). Fortunately this condition is relatively rare and has an excellent simple and reliable DNA test to ensure that dogs are genetically clear of the disease and cannot therefore pass it on to their offspring.

What is Von Willebrands Disease (vWD) ?

This is most common of all bleeding disorders in dogs. There are three types of this disease, caused by an abnormally low (Type I) or structurally abnormal (Type II) or even completely absent Von Willebrands factor (Type II) in their blood plasma.

Type II and Type III forms of the disease are the ones that are most severe, affected dogs will suffer from severe bleeding from relatively minor cuts and it is often fatal. Type I dogs may have less severe symptoms.

In some breeds, such as the Doberman Pinscher vWD has threatened to wipe out the breed completely, the overall incidence in tested dogs has been as high as 50% of tested dogs are carriers and 26% affected. Fortunately the Doberman is a Type I form of the disease.

The German Wirehaired Pointer (Deutsch Drahthaar) is only known to suffer from the more severe Type II vWD (along with the German Shorthaired Pointer).

In Type II VWD dogs often die from a severe loss of blood from any form of trauma or operation as their blood does not clot as normal. This is especially true in internal injuries, even bruising, where the bleeding is not visible. Bitches can even die from a normal season.

Development of a DNA Test

At one time people carried out blood coagulation tests to time how long a particular dog’s blood took to clot. This was then used by some breeders to try and eliminate dogs from their breeding that may be suspected of producing longer bleeding times.

However a high profile case in Holland of two affected dogs from separate litters that shared the same very popular stud dog, meant that this method had proved unreliable and inaffective. A DNA test was needed.

Through a collaboration of many Dutch kennels and our own kennels (we had an imported litter from the same sire) sufficient samples were provided that allowed a test to be developed. The University of Utrecht, funded and developed the first DNA test in 1997.

Ever since that date a long, tireless worldwide campaign has been on-going in the breed to try and force mandated use of this test for all breeding stock. The Dutch German Wirehaired Pointer Club were the first to do so.

Today, there are a number of laboratories that operate the original DNA test the primary ones being University of Utrecht (Holland), TiHo Hannover (Germany), Laboklin (Germany, UK). VetGen (US) and Finnzymes also offer their own specific VWD Type II DNA tests for the German Wirehaired Pointer.

How to do the vWD DNA Test

Each of the laboratories listed above can provide a DNA testing kit to you or your vet. Your vet normally takes the sample and checks the identity of the dog being tested, but of course unless the dog is tattooed or microchipped then this may not be 100% reliable.

Originally the tests required a small blood sample to be taken from your dog and sent to the laboratory. This is still the most preferred and most reliable form of the test, but it is more expensive. It is now possible to use an alternative method where a special mouth scraper (a bit like a cotton bud) is used to scrape skin cells from the lining of the dog’s mouth.

The DNA is then extracted from these samples and an absolute result of the genetic make-up of the dog can be determined and the dog classified as clear, carrier or affected.

We recommend Laboklin as the preferred test laboratory for the UK – see details of how to apply Laboklin Germany have been the most widely used laboratory worldwide (over 80%) for this test and offered the test since 2000.

The Campaign Continues

In 2010 the Verein Deutsch Drahthaar (VDD) finally recognised the disease and included it in the ‘breeding exclusions’ list for genetic diseases.

In 2010 the UK Kennel Club has also finally added vWD to their Health Database, which is a start, however the UK GWP Breed Club, at this time, still do not recommend it officially. We continue our 13 years of lobbying the UK GWP Club and the Kennel Club to mandate vWD DNA testing of parents as a condition of registration of puppies.

There is a long-standing pan-European collaboration between the main laboratories, many of the top breeders and some of the breed clubs through the tireless efforts of Hans Keuper in Holland. Hans maintains a voluntary European database of vWD DNA test results which he makes available to anyone who contributes towards it. Please send your test results to Hans who has a database covering Germany, UK, Norway, Holland, Finland, Italy and others.

Sadly despite all our efforts, Hans has recently had details sent to him of an affected dog in Germany – so we still need to campaign to completely rid the breed of this disease – which can be done so easily if people test.

Please contact us if you require contact details for Hans Keuper.