Hepatic Fibrosis
Fibrosis itself causes no symptoms but can lead to portal hypertension when the scarring distorts blood flow through the liver.
The general name for the final stages of chronic inflammatory conditions of the liver is chronic fibrotic liver disease. It is also called hepatic fibrosis. This is a group of diseases leading to death because of liver failure.
This dog disease can be caused by chronic injury in case of inflammation, viruses and increased hepatic copper concentration. This dog disease may be present at the time of birth which may also develop into cirrhosis. It is basically an overly exuberant wound healing when excessive connective tissue builds up in the liver and excessive amounts of scar tissues replace the normal structural elements of tissues. Even though, fibrosis has no symptoms but it may cause portal hypertension due to the distortion of blood flow through the liver because of scarring.
Symptoms
The disease normally affects young German shepherd dogs which suffer from swelling of the abdomen, hepatic encephalopathy, appetite loss, and loss of weight.
This dog disease normally affects humans, cats, piglets, and dogs. Concentration of hepatic copper is measured in congenital hepatic fibrosis patients.
For diagnosis and assessment of fibrosis, needle liver biopsy is used. The first step is to treat the underlying causes of this dog disease. There is a variable response to treatment with anti-fibrotic therapy. Soon after diagnosis of this dog disease, some dogs die whereas the others might survive two and a half years, and some may even survive for four years.
Treatment of Hepatic Fibrosis
Treatment of hepatic fibrosis is done by two methods: firstly eradicate the primary cause, and then directly attacking pathways which are used for producing liver scars. Till now antifibrotic therapy is not available. However underlying causes may be treated. And the survival rate of the dogs may vary according to the conditions of the causes.
