Hi Zara,
I don't have any personal experiences with any of MY dogs, but I'm happy to share some experiences with other Belgian shepherds.
As far as hip dysplasia goes, I think it's alot more common than anyone knows. I can sometimes tell just by looking at a dog if it's dysplastic -- but it's owner wouldn't even have a clue. Because it's so normal for dogs to be dysplastic, we assume that all dogs look and move this way. I think that if every single dog were to be x-rayed, most of them would be considered dysplastic (how many dogs have decent structure these days?? Poor structure can contribute to joint issues later on). Unfortunatly databases like OFA are not accurate because most people who have a dog x-rayed, only for the vet to tell them their dog is dysplastic, will not send in that x-ray to OFA. Not many breeders want that information on a public database (I'm not one of those breeders, I will gladly admit when I breed a health problem). Not only that, the extreme vast majority of the dogs x-rayed are purebred. This is one reason that people go on about "hybrid vigor." While some of it may remain true, the fact is that mutts don't generally get health tested or certified -- hence why OFA has a much larger amount of purebreds with hip dysplasia than mutts -- not because there is a higher incedence in purebreds.
I think hip dysplasia is very intriguing, genetically. I'd really like to know more about how it works.
Someone I know recently had a litter of Belgians. The dam comes from a long line of OFA excellent and good hips. However, her sire was never x-rayed. Well, turns out the sire has THREE siblings with hip dysplasia (even being out of a line with OFA good and excellent hips). When this bitch was x-rayed after her litter (it was an accidental litter before tests were done), the x-ray confirmed she is likely dysplastic (won't be sent in to OFA).
This is a long line of health tested dogs going several generations back. One of my explanations for this is that while each dog in the pedigree may have had good hips -- it may have had siblings (that were never tested, or were tested and no results were sent in) with dysplasia. That dog could still carry those genetics.
I know of a female Belgian with hip dysplasia that was bred. All of her tested pups had good or excellent hips. However, she had one great granddaughter that consistently produced hip dysplasia in all three of her litters. This is going down three generations of health tested hips after the dysplasia. If every single puppy in each of the dysplastic female's litters were tested, who knows how much dysplasia she actually produced? But only the breeding dogs were tested and found to have good hips, so her line continued (and does to this day).
This is why it's part of my health guarantee that every owner is to certify hips, elbows, and eyes. Otherwise their entire health guarantee is void. I could happen to have the only OFA excellent puppy in the litter and breed it...but what if every single one of it's siblings is dysplastic? If they aren't tested, I won't know, and my OFA excellent dog could produce dysplasia.
I think this is why dysplasia runs rampant in some breeds more than others. It is so genetically entwined, it is hard to get rid of. Not to mention, with the structure of some breeds these days (German shepherds for one) dogs are already predisposed to having issues. If a dog is overangulated in the rear, it's knees wear out, which causes hips to compensate, which causes hips to wear out. If GSDs were OFA'd at an age where this wear-out would naturally occur, as opposed to the usual 2 years that most people want it done by, I think we'd see alot more dysplastic x-rays. By the time the dog is that age, people blame it on age, not genetics. And these dogs have gone on to produce ten generations of dogs who have OFA excellent hips at 2 years of age, but would be considered dysplastic at 4 years of age.
In my breed, the major problem is epilepsy. I find the majority of breeders just don't do enough to prevent it other than to make sure their own dogs don't have it. They breed to typey European show lines with seizure-producing dogs in the pedigree, and wonder why they end up with epilepsy. Seizures usually crop up between 3-4 years of age, but many times they will crop up in dogs as young as a year, and as old as 8 (some argue that dogs that develop seizures after age 7 do not have epilepsy, but rather a brain tumor -- no excuse to continue to breed a dog in my opinion). After 8 most people can be sure that their dog does not have epilepsy, but many Belgians will still develop thyroid problems which will cause seizures. Thyroid problems are seen much more commonly in other breeds, like goldens, but Belgians are much more prone to developing seizures from thyroid problems (or anything really -- seizures can pop up from any health problem a Belgian has, it seems). Most times seizures are just treated with the usual phenobarbital, but most Belgians will end up being PTS even with treatment. Some people estimate that epilepsy in Belgians is as high as 30%. Most breeders will not publicly admit when they produce epilepsy, and so we can't get an accurate estimate. But Belgian people are getting better and better about sharing health statistics publicly, and we're still working on finding the gene for epilepsy so we can eliminate it from the gene pool. Until then I'm using low-risk lines until I have no other options but to outcross to something new.
I love talking about stuff like this, if I can think of anything else to talk about, I'll definatly post it. Another thing I'm interested in -- I find that lines where hip dysplasia pops up, also tend to see some elbow dysplasia. I wonder if there's a seperate gene that affects more than one joint? I've seen a few litters that come out of a line of health tested dogs... until the one litter pops up with a few hip dysplastic dogs and some elbow dysplastic dogs too. Always think that's interesting how both hips and elbows are affected.
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Originally Posted by wolfsoul
All we could try was antibiotics as she would not have been able to handle the other treatments. We didn't have her spayed due to the higher risk with that surgery.
All we could try was antibiotics as she would not have been able to handle the other treatments. We didn't have her spayed due to the higher risk with that surgery.
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