PKD positive pedigree cats

This week Mara came in and I should tell you straight up that Mara is a bit special to me. Mara weighs next to nothing for a cat of her size and when I first saw her a couple of years ago she weighed even less. Mara is a petite 10-year-old female cat, a gentle blue Harlequin with a flat face and mesmerising eyes which look enormous on her small body. By now, you may have also guessed that Mara is a pure Persian. You might well wonder why I am emphasising her Persian breed. Well, occasionally, the particular breed forms a very important consideration when it comes to veterinary medical care, an example of which Mara and Polycystic Kidney Disease is a typical case. Many of you would know that certain ailments are more predominant among certain species – both in dogs and cats. This is what is termed ‘predisposition’, which means that certain species are more prone to suffer specific ailments or diseases. In addition to this predisposition, certain medical ailments are actually inherited. When we colloquially refer to a disease as running in the family, what we are in fact stating is that the ailment is literally written in the genes. Since inherited genetic diseases can occur in...