Dear NTCA Members, NTUAS donors, and Friends,

Two years have passed since our NTUAS Study (Canine Health Foundation Grant #2232) was announced and fundraising commenced. In that time, and with your help, we met our 2016 fundraising campaign goal and more than 150 Norwich terriers were evaluated at the four participating veterinary schools. In October, Drs. Bryden Stanley and Grace Lai spoke at the NTCA Annual Health Seminar, presenting preliminary study results. This presentation describes the first step of the study, which is to clearly characterize the condition by performing in-depth evaluations on many Norwich terriers of all ages.

The doctors’ presentation can be viewed at https://norwichterrierclub.org/ntca-annual-health-seminar-2017/

At this time, Dr. Stanley and her colleagues are completing the statistical analyses and developing and validating the endoscopy scoring system. Our work is not finished – we are planning a longitudinal follow-up of the younger dogs to determine if UAS is progressive and developing educational materials for veterinarians and owners.

As 2017 draws to a close, please consider a gift to support the NTUAS Study as part of your year-end giving; the study has been extended and the new end date is 12-31-2017. Donations can be made directly to the Canine Health Foundation (CHF) using the web address http://www.akcchf.org/NTUASdonate
Please be sure check your email receipt to be sure the donation goes to MOU-2232. Donations made directly to CHF to support the study must be made by 12-31-2017 (donations designated for health studies can be made to NTCA at any time.)

The NTCA gratefully acknowledges the support of the Norwich terrier community, whose devotion to our breed has made this study possible. NTCA’s continued health research to benefit Norwich terriers is possible because of your support.
Sincerely,
Paula Smith
Chair, Ways & Means Committee
Susan Miller Hall
Chair, NTCA Health Committee
Jane Schubart
NTCA President

Thanks to the immense commitment and dedication from the members of the NTCA, we have been able to undertake a huge cross-sectional study characterizing NTUAS. The results of this recently completed study will enable us to develop a NTUAS Severity Score, which we hope will be useful to breeders as they pick their breeding stock in this wonderful little breed. Like all studies, however, the results have generated even more questions. Is NTUAS heritable? Is the
condition progressive? What are the best surgical interventions and when should we undertake them? Are there ways of assessing dogs without performing laryngeal examinations (which require a light anesthetic)?

Some of these questions have been partly answered already and some we would like to continue to work on.

-Dr. Bryden Stanley

Pictured below are some of the doctors, students, and dogs who participated in the NTUAS study.