Symmetrisk Lupoid onychodystrofi, SLO, beskrevs för första gången på mitten av 90-talet. Sjukdomen karaktäriseras av att alla klor avlossas inom en kort tidsperiod utan att andra samtidiga systemiska fynd ses. Den bakomliggandeorsaken till sjukdomen är ännu inte känd, men eftersom liknande histologiska fynd som vid systemisk lupus erythematosus, SLE och kutan lupus erythematosus, LE, kan identifieras har en autoimmun bakgrund misstänkts.Hörnstenen i SLE-diagnostiken är ANA-test, för att påvisa cirkulerande antinukleära antikroppar. I enstaka studier har man tidigare hos vissa hundar med SLO kunnat påvisa ANA.Syftet med den här studien har varit att göra ANA-test på hundar med symmetrisk kloavlossning och SLO, samt att genom journalstudier beskriva hur sjukdomen ser ut i Sverige idag.Hundar provtagna och testade för ANA är sju bearded collies, fem Riesenschnauzer, tre Rhodesian ridgeback och en toypudel samt tolv kontrollhundar av raserna bearded collie, Riesenschnauzer och Rhodesian ridgeback. Samtliga hundar var negativa för ANA.

It is a well known fact today that suffering due to skin disorders is one of the most common causes to veterinary calls. For the Doberman breed included in the group of working dogs, the frequency and distribution of the different skinrelated diagnoses that causes visits to the veterinary clinics remains undocumented. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the frequency of skinrelated problems causing veterinary visits of Doberman at four different veterinaryclinics in Sweden retrospectively, and compare these results with dogs in general and three other working dog breeds with the help of information collected from Agria - a Swedish animal insurance company. The total amount of veterinary calls that were registered at the clinics in question during the time of the study was 2460 visits. From these, 658 visits were due to skinrelated disorders, which amount to 27%. The most frequent cause to skinsuffering was injury caused by trauma, 15,7% of the Dobermans that were included in the study were affected, the second most frequent cause was inflammatory and infectious skin problems with 12,3% followed by neoplastic changes in the skin with 7% of the Dobermans affected.

In 1936 a governmental breeding project was started with aim on military use. The police later came to use dogs from this project as well. In order to utilize dogs that could fit for other purposes training and education of dogs for search of different substances and of guide dogs for blind persons was performed. A political decision to privatize the whole dog programme was taken in 1992. During most part of the time one had serious economical issues since too few of the dogs that were bred could be considered to fulfil the basic demands for service. To satisfy the need of service dogs private bred dogs were bought as well.