was reading another post about hip-scores and it got me thinking

the breed I have don't have to be tested for hip scores - in fact the only advised tests are for liver shunt and now breeders/owners are urged to test for Factor VII Deficiency, though it hasn't been made a necessity as yet

but I was wondering - if there is a health test available (hip score, eye tests, heart tests etc) should they be done?? I know some breeders do test for heart issues (am not clued up on this but it is something I am gathering info on) even though it probably won't mean anything other than statistics to said breeder/owner....

My own personal thought, is that if you can look at a 5 gen pedigree of a dog you own, and you know at what age all predecessors died and of what cause, then surely that can only be a good thing? But unless you have been "in" the breed for a considerable length of time, then maybe this just isn't necessary unless you are breeding for a certain line??

Sorry, I don't think I'm explaining myself very well!!

I know some people are trying to collate information about the health of the breed, and issues such as c-sections are cropping up, as well as the obvious concerns re heart issues and bone cancer etc, and there have been instances of AF creeping in as well.

Is it too much?? Is this only really a concern of those, as mentioned, who are breeding with a long-term goal in mind??

There are people on here covering virtually every breed of dog there is - would you test for any particular health issue even if it wasn't prevalent in your breed??

Maybe I'm over-thinking this - call it Sunday-morning-itis ;)

As far as I am concerned all breeds should be hip scored as HD occurs in all breeds, you only have to look at the OFA statistics to see that the worst breed for hips is the Bulldog, yet very seldom scored in the UK.

The basic eye test too, as many breeds have some eye anomaly or another,a nd I know of one breed where one was discovered on random testing when the bred didn't test.

As for other health tests then I think there needs to be evidence of a breed issue, such as hearts etc, as if every breed did every imaginable test, where would ti end, costing breeders thousands and pretty soon no one except very well heeled folk could afford to breed at all.

For example we don't elbow test our breed, there have been those who have done them in the USA and 100% normal, 1 was done in UK by owners new to the breed also 100% normal, so would not appear to be something we need to do unless we start getting clinical cases.

This is where the BVA could be so much more help if they had Vets accurately report incidences of inherited problems so breeds could be alerted when these became statistically significant. 

Of course then they would have to properly identify their patients breed, and only cal them the breed if they were KC registered as whatever breed.

I do think that the cost of for example hip scoring is prohibitively expensive.  I am yet to be able to persuade any no breeding owner to have them done when they get quoted well over £200 to get it done and have to have their poor baby given a GA.

I think we are lucky in our breed that at least 20% of the total number KC registered puppies go on to be hip scored and eye tested so the results are a reliable indication of the breeds health as a whole, this is not the case in numerically strong breeds where the number tested is a tiny percentage of the overall population.  Within a numerically small breed with most breeders breeding to a code of ethics it is much easier to spot an emerging problem, and formualte policy accordingly.  This is why our breed decided to ask breeders to test Kideney function as soem cases of Familial renal problms ahve cropped up world wide, but thigns are very unclear based on extensive reserach in Scandinavia etc, so we are monitoring the situation.

I agree that the costs will be a big issue - I wasn't aware how much a hip-score cost, and to me that doesn't really encourage anyone to go ahead unless they own a breed in which it is known to be an issue - maybe not morally correct but it will have a bearing

I would suggest that maybe the Breed Clubs could assist and deal with a certain Vet etc for subsidised tests, but again unless it is something prevalent I don't think they would go for it (I don't think mine would)

and again, if it was thought to cause distress to the animal then that would also put owners off

Ultimately it has to be personal choice (and bank balance!) - where would it end?? Genetic testing?? ........

Ah but hip scoring and eye testing are the two tests I believe all breeds should have done, it is the rest like slipping patella, hearts, thyroid and other issues that are much more breed rather than species specific.

I don't disagree, and in fact am looking in to these health tests - it may mean nothing to any other breed owners but I will have the health info for my records ;)

There are a small group of us who are concerned about these issues and are of the opinion that we should be testing more.

It may not change anything in the short term, if at all in the great scheme of things, but you have to start somewhere :) 

I think if the basic Hip and eye testing is done, and your breed has a health survey to which any health issues can be reported by breeders and owners, then if something becomes a concern then the breed clubs can look at what is needed or available to tackle it.

For example if few are BVA hip scored to give meaningful data, using the OFA data you can show what percentage of your breed have abnormal hips in that country (all breeds have similar backgrounds internationally so the data should e valid on a breed wide basis).

You can then propose to the breed clubs that testing is required, if nothing else to keep things good.

Looking at the OFA there are quite a few toy breeds with bad hips, so gets rid of those people who say it's only bigger dogs etc. that get HD. I think all dogs who are going to be considered for breeding be them pedigrees or crosses should be done myself as with eye testing also.  I think that the results would be very interesting!

that's what I'm thinking - it may not be a particular health issue for some breeds, but if it gives you more information when it comes to decisions re breeding, then I'd  rather have that info than not!

Depends why you are testing.
If it's for your own peace of mind, collating health histories of potential breeding stock or just prempting future problems then that's one thing.

Testing for acceptance by your peers, requirements by ABS, to look good on pedigrees or to avert potential litigation quite another.

My husband calls it my dog's CVs and says that i'm just obsessed with making them look good.... I had hoped I was doing it for the former reasons but one can get caught up with the latter.

I asked my then vet to hip score my dog who was having surgery anyway to remove a retained testicle and explained that I wanted him scored just for the further information it adds to a numerically small breed. I got a ton of lecturing from him and his colleagues about how "you shouldn't breed from him so you don't need to score him," etc etc, on top of their opinion that he should be fully castrated. Sometimes it isn't just the owner or the breeder, vets also need educating!

Its an interesting question..

Honestly I think the more transparency there is the better.. but..

Then you get the situation where because we KNOW what diseases might crop up within a certain breed its very easy to state that x breed have a lot of 'known health problems'.. if people dont test then they can truthfully state 'no known health problems'..

Hence the ongoing row over whether xbreeds/mongrels are in fact healthier than pedigrees - common sense ought to tell us that they arent, but teh statistics say otherwise purely because we HAVE statistics for pedigrees and we dont have them for mongrels (well we do, but only via insurance companies data and more pedigrees are insured than mongrels!).

It also depends on what people intend to DO with the results they get - knowing whats going on is great.. 'breeding by numbers' much less so and I am of the opinion as you know, in our breed, that chucking otherwise excellent dogs out of an already numerically small genepool PURELY because they carry Factor vii is bl**dy silly and short sighted. On the other hand, not knowing.. or pretending not to know, a particular dogs factor vii status is also not clever..

Hip scoring is another issue where its good to know, but chucking good dogs out of the genepool because of it isnt necessarily the right thing to do - more things affect hipscore than JUST the parents dogs hipscores - so numbers on a piece of paper wont tell you if a hipscore is as it is because the parents were... or because the dog fell down the stairs at 9 months old..

On the whole though i think we should test for the basics through out all breeds, they are things that affect the life and wellbeing of the dog, and I believe it would weed out the rogues if there was a 'basic industry standard' where ALL dogs had to have hipscores, current eye cert and whatever else is relevant.

I still UTTERLY fail to see why the KC cannot refuse registration to those pups who have not had the necessary tests/bred from parents without necessary tests. It would instantly give the KC registration some cast iron meaning!

I health test my dogs even though as a breed we don't have any listed, I do for my personal information.  Having spoken with others within our minority breed it seems there are a few also x-raying to check for Legg Perthes disease which occurs occassionally so my thoughts are pay the extra £40 and get them scored see where we are with the breed.

I do hips, eyes, patella's, thyroid and MPS as I have carriers via an American import.  As a breed we had a DNA collection day for Helsinki every breeder supported it, next yr we're hoping (hall permitting) to have an eye testing clinic, still working on the legistics of that one but hoping to pull it off.  I do think basic's should be done for all breeds so hips, eyes and patella's to see where show dogs are in reality rather than just small pockets as well as ring fence ourselves from the likes of R£PCA who seem hellbent on seeing an end to our hobby and breeds. 

The KC aren't doing us any favours as an accreddited breeder I'd rather see a accolade for health testing and breeding from animals with good results ie below BMA, interesting for those of who don't have a BMA mind but you see where I'm coming from.  I also feel the BVA are letting us down on the hip front after 40 yrs you'd think they'd have something more to tell us or a more accurate form of testing, costs enough thats for sure.

I went to a veterinary seminar last week in Cambridge given by Professor Gail Smith, from the University of Pennsylvania and will be writing about this for my next Dogs Today column.

Professor Smith has developed the PennHIP method of testing hips and it's impressive. It's more accurate and more predictive than the current  BVA/KC or OFA schemes and some breeders (partic in the US and Australia) are already using it to great effect. I believe vet Mike Guilliard (Nantwich) is already offering it here and there were a fair few other UK vets there last week also being PennHIP accredited.

Also there was Brian Turner, chief scrutineer of the BVA/KC scheme, so there would seem to be interest in at least exploring the PennHIP method for the UK. More info here:

http://research.vet.upenn.edu/Default.aspx?alias=research.vet.upenn.edu/pennhip

Jemima

I have no plans to breed from my flat coated retriever.  However i have still had him hip scored (0-2) and eye tested (clear).  I agree with the fact that it will add greater knowledge to the list.  It also gives me peace of mind that he is a healthy as possible.  He has also had his patella's checked even thought his is not a requirement.

Mike Guilliard at Nantwich was my Vets pracitce for over 20 yrs, my girls still use Nantwich Practise, not so good on the exotics of course. Videx GSD's have a piece by him on this very technique and his charges of course

Hi Wobbliebob,

Many flatcoat breeders and owners health test whether or not they plan to breed from a dog. Many like myself test for other conditions, which we are not known to be affected by. Two common examples are testing for PRA etc and scoring elbows. All members of the Flatcoated Retriever Society are very honest about ill health in the breed and in their own lines. At Discover Dogs recently all representatives on th breed stand will have been honest about the health of flatcoated rerievers and the FCR society had a poster with health aspects of the breed displayed on the stand for any visitor to see as is usually the case. Also we are very open about what age our dogs die and what is the cause of death.

Those of us who have Australian Shepherds have of course known about the Pennhip scoring for several years - if anyone is interested in the comparisons, here is a useful comparative table, which was comprised by Shilo Shepherds in the USA

http://www.shilohshepherds.info/hipXrayCertification.htm

Hope it is of interest!

I checked out the comparison.  A question, when you have hips scored in the UK/USA is that all you get, a report saying good, bad or ugly plus the score?  Or do you get something which tells you where those numbers occurred?

Hello??   Anyone?  You get hip scores done, you must know what paperwork you get.   I'm interested because testing in Australia gives you results in a different format to what I'm seeing in the those comparison charts.   You can see if you have a 0 - 6 on either side on the Norberg Angle.  You can see if there is a problem with the cranial head.   Good, bad or ugly tells you relatively little, hence my question.

> Or do you get something which tells you where those numbers occurred?

IN UK/Australia you get told where the numbers occurred,a nd there is a technical article that tells you exactly what each number against each part of the hips would mean.  A html copy can be seen here: http://www.thedogscene.co.uk/details/canine-hip-scoring--criteria-1090.html

The US system just says Excellent, Good, Fair, Borderline, Mild, Moderate or Severe Dysplasia.

There is a comparison between the UK/Oz, FCI and OFA systems here: http://www.offa.org/hipgrade.html at the bottom of the page.

Well that chart showing UK ratings is wrong, and not our current system, which has been in operation for as many years  (21) as I have been in dogs.

In the UK the hips are scored on different aspects, norberg angle, subluxation, cranial actabular edge, dorsal acetabular edge, cranial effective acetablar rim, acetabular fossa, caudal acetabular edge, femoral head/neck exotosis, femoral head recontrouring;  other than the caudal acetabular edge which is scored 0-5, all the other aspects are scored 0-6.   The nearer to 0/0 is obviously the best score and 53/53 total 106 is the worse score.   All breeds have a mean average which is available from the BVA.

The system in  Australia, is I believe, the same as the UK.

One worry I would have about the pennHip system would be the number of x-rays required, with regard to over exposing a dog to radiation, especially if you are also x-raying elbows, where again a number of x-rays are required.   Have looked at how they assess the dogs hips and to me, a mere novice, it looks to be very complicated and I would have to worry that my puppy people would fail to understand the result, which would add even more to the whole question of trying to educate the public and also of trying to educate dog breeders!  Keep it simple I say.

All systems are subjective to some degree or other, in that respect cannot see any advantage of one over the other whichever you use.   Have been using the UK system since its inception and before that with the old 'pass/fail or breeders letter' scheme, and have had very good results over the years.  

Thanks for the responses.  Right, dogsdinner, Australia uses the same as the UK.   I just wasn't sure from the original comparison chart I looked at.   Apologies for not getting the terminology right, I don't have a report with me at present.

Yes, it is subjective.   As an exercise we once sent the x-rays to the three places that score and got quite differing results back.   It was interesting that one saw something neither of the other two did, and/or a difference when they did score the same thing. 

Another aspect of this is the balance of the score.  Imho a 0/8 is worse than a 4/4 for example.   Please note I am using those numbers as an example, not saying either is necessarily good!

>As an exercise we once sent the x-rays to the three places that score and got quite differing results back. 

We only have one place that scores, with a panel of scorers.

>Imho a 0/8 is worse than a 4/4 for example

Many people would take the opposite view; that the high-scoring side was due to environmental damage, and the low-scoring side was the genetic 'norm' for that animal.

In a bored morning I worked out the average of all hipscores published to date: it seems that the average hipscore of 'the domestic dog' is 16. Going by that, anything less is better than average for the species.

ALL?  In just a morning.  Wow!