We offer a new genetic test for Freiberger that can be used to identify carriers and affected animals of hypertriglyceridemia-induced pancreatitis (HIP).

The disease is a hereditary metabolic defect. The HIP gene variant causes the loss of function of an important enzyme in fat metabolism, which ensures that absorbed fats are processed. Without this enzyme, there is a harmful accumulation of fat in the blood, which in turn leads to acute inflammation of the pancreas.

Affected foals suffer from loss of appetite, diarrhea, fever and apathy. As a rule, foals die in the first few weeks of life or have to be euthanized.

HIP is inherited in an autosomal recessive manner. This means that a foal is only affected if it has received an affected gene from both its sire and dam. This means that both the sire and dam must carry the mutated gene. Carrier animals themselves are clinically completely inconspicuous, but have a 50% probability of passing on the inherited trait to their offspring. When mating two carriers, there is a risk that the offspring will be affected by the disease (25%). Therefore, a carrier should never be mated with another carrier. Genetic testing is the only way to avoid such mating.