Call for help...need info, etc to prove someone wrong :)

[lilspaz68]

Someone on another rat forum is proclaiming that female rats who have had a litter are less likely to get tumours.

Pullllease!!!!

I need websites, things I can quote and disprove this statement. Otherwise people might read that and get the idea, I'll let my girl be all natural and have a litter to help her with tumours later. :doh:

 

[Moon]

I do recall reading somewhere around here that pyometra is more common in an unspayed, unbred animal... hopefully they're thinking of that... :roll:

Dunno if I can help with disproving that, though....

PM me with link?

 

[jorats]

Don't know of any website but our one girl that did have a litter, was one that did develop a tumour. :roll:
This of course of all before the spays.

 

[Shelley]

Out of all my females, the only one that got a tumor was a female who had a litter of babies. Her children were all tumor-free, but the mom got a mammary tumor at about 26 months of age. I don't know statistics... but considering out of 6 females I've had (that have since passed), the only one to get a tumor HAD gotten pregnant. It sounds like another piece of garbage to me... the same as people who think they should let their female dogs have a litter before they spay

:badidea:

 

[papercrow]

Maybe this person is thinking of people, because I know if a woman has breastfed then her chances of developing breast cancer goes down substantially. I don't have any facts to back that up but I'm pretty sure it's true. How's that for proof!

 

[Arlene]

If it helps, two of the three rats I've kept that had litters also got tumors.The other girl who didn't get tumors was the one who was spayed after having her babies.

 

[Fidget]

Very minimal contribution, it's just the best I can offer, and I sure respect your attempt to diffuse a bad situation.

Those that die in childbirth don't get tumors afterwards.

 

[Bronwyn]

I like that one!

The mutant Tsc-2 tumor suppressor gene could be what they're thinking of. In this case, we lose.

For those not familiar with genetics terms, wild-type simply means the allele that occurs at a locus that has not been tampered with, what would occur naturally so to speak.

In short, I'm fairly sure this gene type is dominant over the wild type and pregnancy protects the organism from developing certain types of tumors. That's the really simplified version.

http://carcin.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/co ... 22/12/2049

Unfortunately the database for other journal articles is down tonight for Queen's but for the sake of what we're trying to protect against...let's not mention this, lol.

 

[Fidget]

Maybe they're right? Not everything that's goof for a particular rattie is good for ratties as a whole.
I grew up hearing that female cats were much better pets if they were allowed to have at least one litter before they were spayed. Thank goodness my parents didn't want the litter and fixed them but it didn't change the trust that it might be true