%0 Journal Article
%T Familial occurrence of Danish and Dutch cases of the bovine brachyspina syndrome
%A J£¿rgen S Agerholm
%A Klaas Peperkamp
%J BMC Veterinary Research
%D 2007
%I BioMed Central
%R 10.1186/1746-6148-3-8
%X Two Danish cases and a Dutch case are described. The calves were delivered following a slightly prolonged gestation period. Gross lesions consisted of growth retardation, significant shortening of the entire spine and long and slender limbs. Additionally, inferior brachygnatism and defects of several internal organs were recorded. The cases were diagnosed as having the brachyspina syndrome based on the presence of essential lesions. The parents of each case were genetically related and linked to the first reported case by a common ancestor.The findings support the hypothesis that the brachyspina syndrome in Holstein cattle is inherited autosomal recessively and illustrate some of the assumed phenotypical variation of this syndrome. The brachyspina syndrome may be an emerging disease in the Holstein breed.Recently, a new congenital lethal syndrome was reported in a Danish Holstein calf (case DK1) [1]. The syndrome was characterized by severely reduced body weight, widespread vertebral malformation causing significant shortening of the spine (brachyspina), and malformation of the heart, kidneys and testicles. The cause of the syndrome was not determined. But as the calf was the result of artificial breeding between genetically related and phenotypically normal animals and as it was the only affected calf occurring in a herd of 96 adult females, such an incident could be explained by transmission by descent of a defective recessive allele from a common ancestor. However, further cases were needed to evaluate the hypothesis of autosomal recessive inheritance.Here, we report two additional cases from Denmark (cases DK2 and DK3) obtained through the Danish Bovine Genetic Disease Programme [2] and a case from the Netherlands (case NLD1) submitted for routine diagnostic.A female Holstein calf with a body weight of 10.8 kg (Fig. 1) was born in March 2006 at gestation day 289 by a two-year-old heifer. The length of the spine was severely reduced with prominence of the anterio
%U http://www.biomedcentral.com/1746-6148/3/8