I have been extremely selective about breeding my bitches and have always selected stud dogs with 0/0 scores.  I have recently had a Labrador bitch hip scored by the BVA and am very disappointed with the outcome, she is highly athletic, bullet proof and a fantastic dog to own, I have read everything there is to on hip displasia and cannot understand how she has come out with what I consider a poor score, albeit the scores are equal for both hips - whilst she is still below the breed threshold I am considering appealing with the BVA and asking for a rescore which they allow, has anyone ever experienced this before, I would welcome the views of others.

hi i  what was the score of your labrador bitch? and more to the point  what was the hip score of her dam? i am not sure what the breed means average is for labradors  but going by my breed it is 19, you can put in for an appeal but to tell you the truth if there below the means average and are equal i dont really see the point. just because the parents have good hip scores it does not guarantee the puppies shall have, there are no better scores than 0/0, she could be tacking after her mother or a grandparent, as only a percentage is inherited from there parents or it could just be enviromental, you say that she is very athletic, over exercising and over feeding  at to young an age could have also contribute to not such a good score, not that you have overfed or overexercised your puppy but we all know what labs can be like when it comes to food, considering some of the scores i have seen just lately i would be happy with what you have. all the best in what ever you choose to do. molly.

Personally, I am always wary of 0:0 scores. IMO, I would be more worried about selecting a stud dog that would suit my bitches overall type, along with trying to improve on breed type and standard in the next generation. Hip scores would be towards the top of my list of requirements in selection of stud dog, but I know from experience a mating of two dogs with low and even 0:0 scores does not produce a generation of low scoring dogs.

If you feel you should appeal, then do, but just because your dog has a score that you are not happy with (even if it is below the breed average) then it does not mean your dog will have hip displaysia, or even have any other of problems later in life. Personally, I would be over the moon that I have managed to breed a dog which that is happy, full of life, love etc, the scores would be a huge bonus.

I agree that low hips scores are good to look at on paper, but as we all know dog breeding needs a lot of luck as well as careful planning.

May I ask what breed you have, and what score has come back?

Maybe you have used a dog with 0:0 scores.. but did you look at what the dog has been producing, what his background is... and what results his siblings are, AND what they have been producing etc.. there is much more to a dog than just HIS hips...

They do indeed allow the x-ray to be resubmitted and reassessed. However I don't think the score would ever actually be altered by more than a point or two and it could of course go up rather than the reduction you would be hoping for.  A hip score below 15 in total should never have an impact on a dogs health and or working capabilities and would not be sufficiently worrying to preclude breeding from an otherwise outstanding and healthy bitch.

What was the score? Differs among breeds but 12 and below is fine for me... any higher and i would not breed - personally. Definately get them re assessed - also try hydrotherapy... i know someone who had their dog hip scored and were dissapointed... after 4 months of hydrotherapy the scores were fantastic, and the dog was happier too

> i know someone who had their dog hip scored and were dissapointed... after 4 months of hydrotherapy the scores were fantastic

Athough you can appeal on an assessment I did not think you could submit new plates some time later.  I am not at all sure that exercise can change a score anyway as it is the boney structure of the hip that is being assessed.  As I understand it the sedation and the rotation release the hip from it muscle hold.  Nor can I see any point it "improving" the score after all you want to know for your own deliberations just what you are breeding from.
Edited.  I have just read the other thread and it would appear you mean the dog's HD clinical symptoms improved, not his score, after hydrotherapy. 

Any score below late teens is functionally normal.  0/0 scores are perfection.

hi,there is a time limit as to when you can appeal to the results of hip and elbow scores with the b.va, i have to disagree with you regarding exercising and it not having any  effect on hips it is a well known fact that over exercising a young puppy can have detrimental effects on its hips and bone structure,  and as enviromental situations etc climbing stairs and furniture etc as is over feeding a young dog  and it becoming obese.

>is over feeding a young dog  and it becoming obese.

A puppy doesn't have to be obese for wrong feeding to affect the joints. Unbalanced supplementing can be detrimental too.

>i know someone who had their dog hip scored and were dissapointed... after 4 months of hydrotherapy the scores were fantastic,

You can't submit new xrays on appeal - only the original one for re-examination.

i had a fcr whos hip score was 52 avage for the breed 9
her mum was 8 and her dad was A SHE WASnt OVER EXCERSIE OR over weight,
she did well in the show ring not showning that she had high hips though her movement,

when she had her hip x ray the vet did say they didnt look good so i rush the plate over to a top spec vet he looked that them and stating that the  x ray were not good. by the way they were taken and the type of film and the  xray meachine was old but there was a big problem with her hips so i send them off and that was the result we got back that was taken by my nomal vet.

so this time  with pagan i had her hips/elbows and patella done at the top spec vet which cost me £850 to have done but the x ray were in 3d what a different in film and machine, to get a better picture.

just waiting for reusult.
fingers cross

> i have to disagree with you regarding exercising and it not having any  effect on hips it is a well known fact that over exercising a young puppy can have detrimental effects on its hips and bone structure

Yes, you could damage them but can you improve hips with exercise.  I doubt it although you may be able to improve the symptoms but improving the muscular support.

i know a puppy does not have to be obese to have an effect on its hips and that there are several other reasons that could contribute ,but over exercising and over feeding  are just a couple of the culprits, and yes over supplementing especially with calcuim intake can also be detrimental  to a puppys rapid growth period and  can contribute towards o.c.d.

-- You can't submit new xrays on appeal - only the original one for re-examination

It wasn't submitted... the woman could tell by the x ray that it wasnt great

>It wasn't submitted... the woman could tell by the x ray that it wasnt great

Then it wasn't scored.

What's the point of only submitting good plates? It gives a false idea of the state of the breed, and is almost worse than not x-raying at all.

I've just had Jessie's hips done & sadly looking at the plates(which are of top quality)it is obvious that they are not brilliant & TBH I doubt very much that I will have a litter from her-I'll have her spayed & then start agian if my Wukee's hips are OK when I have him done(his brother has been Penn Hipped & the results are better than expected for Border Collies-so I am quite hopeful.)

I would never dream of having hips X rayed & not submitting them-there would be no point & doing so keeps the actual BMS lower than it really is

But they were her actual hip scores so its not a false score... thats impossible..
she just toned up and it improved her hips... theres nothing wrong with that.. 3 years on and the bitch is now 7.. no problems at all and hips are still better than before she started toning up.. so its not a fake score, just a healthier bitch
she was not being used for breeding

You seem to be mixing up physical effects of HD and hip score.

As said elsewhere some dogs with high scores due to muscle tone, weight and build will show little or no signs of HD, and others with much lower scores will be cripples.

There are dogs in my breed that are sound good movers with a score over 40 which in some dogs would cause severe problems.

The worst scoring dog in my breed (61) was arthritic in old age, wasn't a brilliant mover but suffered no ill effects in her normal life.

So the bitch you mention will still have had the same score regardless of whether her symptoms improved with hydrotherapy.

But what i was saying was the person that viewed her x rays (who knows how the scoring system works) said at first that the scores would be around 8/8.... after hydrotherapy she was x rayed again and her x ray was alot better... and the person that did it said that they would be better scores

(by the way it was not me, ive always got the dog scored no matter what the person who did them said to be sure).. i was just saying what happened with someone i know

> the person that viewed her x rays (who knows how the scoring system works)

It's not knowing the system it is having the clinical expertise.  It is not at all unheard of for vets to have a stab at the likely score and be wrong.  If it was scored by the expert panel then you don't have a score.  I would still like to understand the physiology that would allow exercise to improve a hip socket.

> said at first that the scores would be around 8/8.... after hydrotherapy she was x rayed again and her x ray was alot better...

So was either Xray plate ever sent for scoring? Hip scoring is done by a panel of vets that are experts in the orthopaedic field - there have a list of separate points they look at - I wouldn't trust to the opinion of one vet's scoring of a plate which they then said had improved on a subsequent plate - especially if they were a GP vet not a specialist?

How old was the bitch at the times the Xrays were taken? Scoring cannot be done before 12 months old in this country, think it is 24 months in the US - because the hips are not yet fully developed (ie the dog has not finished growing etc, obviously the hips are present when the dog is born :-D ).

The other point is that 8\8 while not perfect actually isn't too bad a score at all - ideally something lower for breeding (depending on breed), but functionally shouldn't be a problem for the dog anyway!

I would keep your money in your pocket regarding the re score.
I have a young male dog who was x-rayed whilst overseas prior to importation  aged 1o months and given a raidiology report by a BVA panel member
he was estimated a score of 4/5 , penn scoring was also undertaken to rule our any changes and this was on the median and the report stated it was unlikely the score would increase more than one or two points.
the dog was scored aged 13 months and given a score of 8/8 there were no visable changes to the hip and x-rays were of equal quality the dog was more toned and mature.
We decided to appeal and £70 later got a score of you guessed it 8/8
Edited to say
I have lost faith in the BVA I feel the Penn scoring gives you a better indication of possible changes it would be nice to see it more widely available.

http://www.thedogscene.co.uk/details/canine-hip-scoring---criteria-1090.html

Above link lists criteria used in hip scoring.

>But they were her actual hip scores

Unless the plates were sent away for the panel to score them, then they weren't her hip scores, no matter what a single person said she thought they might come back as. ;)

Muscle tone doesn't affect the hip score; they assess the skeleton - the bone - not the muscle. Dogs can have great muscle tone and be very fit, but still have very poor hips.

Interesting.. thanks for that info guys..

yes the vets said that her hips looked around 8/8 ish.... go away and tone her up.. so carol did and then had her re scored.. they were sent off and came back 5/6

The exercise would not produce a better score, the vet I use does 100's of Hip/Elbow X rays & she will give a guessimate that is very accurate. My bitch is very very fit & hasn't been over exercised & swimming her would not improve her hips pnly her muscles

The actual score and the Vets guess are pretty close (2-3 points per hip) so I see no great difference.

> [url=http://www.thedogscene.co.uk/details/canine-hip-scoring---criteria-1090.html" rel=nofollow]http://www.thedogscene.co.uk/details/canine-hip-scoring---criteria-1090.html[/url]
>
> Above link lists criteria used in hip scoring.

Did the diagram show up earlier? I'd be interested to see the features but no picture today.

No, don't think you could see the diagram now you come to mention it. Will have a Google.

http://users.chariot.net.au/~pknj/cscsa/understanding_hip_dysplasia.htm

A slightly blurry diagram on this one.

http://www.bradiba.de/HD/Scoring.htm

This one any good Lori? Seems to be the best I can find.

Very good Terry. :) Thanks, you earned your Tunnocks for the day :-p