DNAah and the Health Survey 

There’s peanut butter and jelly. Bread and butter. And, of course, the proverbial horse and carriage.

And then there’s the health survey and DNA storage.

All right, so that last example may not be the first thing that comes to mind when you think of famous pairings. But the RRCUS Health & Genetics Committee wants owners and breeders to understand just how inextricably linked they are.

The health survey – formally called the Comprehensive Rhodesian Ridgeback Health Survey, or CRRHS – is a new, electronic, totally confidential survey that will allow us to identify the biggest health threats to our breed.

The DNAah program – short for “DNA Archive at Home” – encourages owners and breeders to save DNA on their dogs before health problems arise. RRCUS provides the DNA swabs free of charge. Owners are asked to swab all their dogs; breeders are asked to do the same, as well as store DNA on entire litters before they are sent to their new homes.

Here’s how the health survey and DNAah work together:

-       Owner fills out electronic health survey

-       Owner requests DNA swabs through health survey, and stores DNA at home

-       Owner notes a health problem on health survey

-       RRCUS sponsors research involving that health problem

-       Owner is contacted by survey moderator Elements Software Engineering,  informed about the research, and encouraged to participate. *

-       Owner contacts RRCUS and arranges to provide stored DNA to researcher

* Please note that any information you provide to the survey is totally confidential, and you or your dog’s identity is never shared with RRCUS. The decision to participate in research and share DNA is entirely yours.

Until recently, our approach to collecting DNA for research has been a very reactive one: The researchers identify what they need, and we go looking for it. With the Comprehensive Rhodesian Ridgeback Health Survey and DNAah, we are becoming proactive in that the data and DNA will be available before it is asked for.

Participating in both the health survey and DNAah costs owners and breeders absolutely nothing, except a few minutes to fill out the survey and to collect the DNA. But for the future health of our breed, your participation is invaluable.

A special note to breeders: We especially need your cooperation with both the health survey and DNAah because you are a crucial source of generational DNA. If you store DNA on every litter before the puppies are sent to their new homes, and collect DNA on their parents and available grandparents, that is three generations worth of DNA. Such generational DNA is invaluable to a researcher, and often impossible to get after the fact, once offspring are dispersed all over the country and older dogs die and their DNA is lost.

So now instead of the RRCUS Health and Genetics Committee struggling to get owners to submit DNA on the one remaining sibling of an affected dog for research, there would be generations of needed DNA right in the breeder’s home. This could literally mean the difference between success and failure in finding a genetic marker for a health defect, and eliminating it from our breed.

So please, take these two steps:

(1) Complete the online Comprehensive Rhodesian Ridgeback Health Survey on every Ridgeback you own that was alive on January 1, 2001. (We also need data on Ridgebacks that are deceased.)

(2) Collect DNA on each Rhodesian Ridgeback you own and/or bred for DNAah. The health survey will be set up so you can request DNA swabs and have your dog entered in the DNAah program automatically.