December 12, 2006

FN - Familial Nephropathy for English Cocker Spaniels

OptiGen is pleased to announce that on December 8th it obtained a license from Merlogen, LLC for the genetic test for an inherited kidney disease referred to as Familial Nephropathy or "FN" (also referred to as Autosomal Hereditary Recessive Nephropathy (AHRN) in canines and as Alport's Syndrome in humans).  We expect to have complete information about the test and ordering details available on this website by December 20th. Please check back later for updates. The ECSCA website will also post updated information soon.

Please note that due to contractual agreements with Merlogen, OptiGen is not allowed to test any new FN samples from Europe or Australia.  We are allowed to test FN in samples that we have already received from these areas.  OptiGen has retained frozen samples from all ECS PRA tests done previously, and we've decided to make these available for FN testing, even if the owner did not pay the fee for long-term storage. We hope this will help many obtain the new FN test more easily.