OFAs take on injury related hip xrays - Page 1

I took my dog to get his OFA Hip Xrays at a very reputable vet in the area ( price was no object, we went with the vet whom had a reputation for doing excellent OFA Xrays!). During the Xray process, the vet came out and asked if we had any undocumented injuries. I admitted that yet, in fact, he had decided to leap in the tree and fell on his hip, and had some walking issues for a few days, and then got better over a week, and I had completely not taken it seriously enough. Turns out, there were some concerns during the Xray in which she said " any knowledgable vet can see it's injury related" and she even suggested maybe I don't both sending to OFA. I did anyways, after all the money spent, what was $35. It took me coming home to realize.... I don't think they take that kind of thought into doing their readings. Is this something anyone has had experience with? She said it killed her, because his other hip was so awesome, and she hates to see that he is possibly going to be discriminated against because of this. It is really bothering me!

They will only take it into consideration if you have x-rays of the dogs hips prior to the injury, I tried it myself once as well. My dog was injured at 4 months old so of course I had no prior x-rays. 

I was afraid if that. We have everything lined up, including going for working titles to breed, and this is a major setback. Are there other options? I wouldn't love my not any press, just want to explore the real life options before making any drastic decisions ( like neutering). His minor flaws have all curred with time, beautiful, smart, high drive, will work at any sport, great family dog, clear of DM, CERF, etc. he got injured right around the age of 2, wish I would have done the prelims!

Look into PennHip, they look first to how tight the hips are to determine their ratings.  I do not know if injury will affect Pennhip or not, talk to them and find out. 
Were you planning on campaigning this male (as a top stud) or just using him within your own breeding program? 
Keep copies of the x-rays that you got of him, get a written/dated/signed statement from the veterinarian attesting that the bad hip is due to injury and her personal opinion to the quality of his good hip.  Seriously also think about having the x-ray examined by a certified radiologist and getting that radiologist's written statement too. 

These things won't affect OFA's decision, and if you were planning on campaigning him as a top stud then that may not go so well now.  But with the x-rays on hand and the written statements from several experts then I don't see a problem with using him for breeding, especially if you get favorable Pennhip score.  

May want to put him on supplements to support his joints/cartilage.  Eventually he will be having arthritic pain from his injured hip.  Hopefully that will not be for years to come though.  Be careful with how much jumping he does.  Any working titles that involve jumping that you wanted him to get, you may want to try getting those sooner rather then later (as long as he isn't favoring his bad hip or rear end.) 

Without an a-stamp or OFA rating he probably won't get anything beyond a SG rating (if you wanted to show him.)   Unless you were considering AKC/UKC show ring (they don't require any health tests.

I actually planned to use him as my own stud. I considered Pennhip, but wish I would have thought about it while we already had him under and being xrayed. I guess we will postpone. I got a copy of the xray, along with samples of dysplastic hips and injury hips. Figuring OFA is going to dump us, but I took the chance! We don't like conformation in the USA. We did try a couple of shows in which we were told that he didn't stand a chance. He is a thick bodied Black and deep red ( so much that I have been asked if I use a red light to photograph him), thick plushy coat, typical West German style, and all american papers and american judges seem to like the overly elongated, stretched, petite pet store looking GsDs in my opinion.

Please let us know what ofa says:

  One of my dogs jumped from my moving pick-up truck before she turned two and was ofa'd, the truck had a cap on the back but she opened it and jumped out, she had some abrasions on her back legs, very minor,after she healed we had her ofa'd and she got a reading of mild HD.
   Now I'm always paranoid before my dogs turn two yrs that they don't go jumping from high places and stuff like that.
 Can you post your dogs x-rays?......
  Here is a picture of my girls hips taken at age seven yrs:

An injury will look very different on an xray than unilateral HD. Given the OP wants to use this dog at stud, rather than assume this is injury related, I would send the xray to a board certifed veterinary radiologist or orthopedic surgeon at the local vet school for an opinion. An injury severe enough to cause a poor fitting hip would probably have caused a lot of pain for dog and most owners would have had it xrayed immediately after the injury happen so it would be documented. It  would not have been a situation where the dog limped for a few days and then recovered on its own.

OFA will probably not certify this dog unless there is clear evidence of an injury like a healed fracture of the pelvis or the surrounding structure. They will consider it unilateral HD regardless of how perfect the other hip. OFA has established that the GSD inherits hip conformation one hip at a time, not bilaterally like some breeds where unilateral HD normally indicates an injury.

I can post the photo when I am back to my home computer ( I left the disc there). We have decided to just wait out what OFA says and go from there. It will be permanently ID'd in how they rate it, so if they sayd HD, then we won't take the chance and breed anyhow! I don't want to seem like a jerk, but I didn't realize the severity of his injury. I have looked at xrays of Unilateral HD, and they are similar to ours, so not sure what to think.

To be honest, there is not really any way to KNOW if the hip is related to injury or HD.  You can get opinions, but who really knows for sure since there were no x-rays before the incident that you think may have caused the injury?  If he does not pass OFA, IMO he would be out for breeding purposes.  If that was your goal/plan, it is tough I know :(  

  Now I can see a very good reason  to PRE LIM with Xrays at 12 or 14 mos old to have as proof that the hips were good before our gsd get so very active...LOTS of things happen when they get so wild and crazy and it is very hard to keep a gsd from jumping or having the tendencies to hurt one hip...

 Might be a great idea , even to know which way the dog is headed anyway, which most of us do for that reason...

  NOW I see why everyone ought to have xrays done...marked and dated...as proof of just what happened to this POSTER>


 GOOD LUCK

   YR