Caring for Hip Dysplasia - Page 2

my gsd was diagnosed with mild dysplasia when he was about 8-9 months old. took him to a surgical specialist for removal of a bone fragment in his elbow (successful) and he told me not to worry much at this point - to keep him lean and to give him regular exercise. swimming is ideal if you can manage that - we have a pool, but it's not heated, so we'll wait til it gets warmer. my dog is now about 20 months. he's large (85 lbs) but i keep him lean too (he's oversized). the specialist said that MAYBE somewhere down the line we might think about hip replacement (it is expensive), but we may never need it. i give him missing link plus, extra gluc/chond (1,500/1,200mg), ester-c (1000mg) and HA. alot of people have had dogs w/hd and many of the dogs seem to live long healthy lives. i know that reading different threads about it on this site has made me much more confident. the specialist said that because of his muscle mass/tone, he may never be affected by the hd except later on some arthritis. good luck to you and your dog.

Some of the best money I spent was to see a canine physical therpaist

She got us started with water walking in an underwater treadmill but, more importantly, gave me stretching and range of motion excercises and an excersie plan.

I use Acti-flex 4000 which is a horse supplement and adjusted the dosage to the same amount of glucosamine as glycoflex III (also a good product but the acti-flex also has MSM)

Like all said - lean dog, build muscle mass to keep those hips as tight as possible.  I could not give direct advice for excercise this dog because his hips are much further out of the sockets than mine (which were nicely in the socket but have a lot of arthritic remodeling)

Sueinc, thanks for the reference on Vet-stem's cutting edge stem cell treatments.  This is one of the most important posts on this forum in a long time.  It's is the sharing of this kind of ground breaking, cutting edge researh which brings new options and hope to many whose GSDs are aging or suffering from maladies.   Thank you for sharing this information.  I hope we see these treatments available in human medicine soon.  This is the kind of posting that makes Oli's site so valuable. 

Thanks for the outpouring of support from the people on this site. Many of the comments and emails were extremely helpful in finding and making the right decisions for our dog. Some not so much. haha. All seemed to have good intentions and I am definitely grateful.

D

HI guys,

I received a few request for follow up and wanted to let you all know how treatment was going with Duke.

After the post I received a lot of advice from people on the board and spent countless hours researching the disease using google as a primary search for information.

My findings were a mix of hope and disappointment,

1) I work in the human orthopedic sales and have become a strong believer in a conservative medicine. That being said, Previcox (NSAID) and Dasuquin (Glucosamine Supplement) have absolutely changed my dogs mood and comfort level. He does not whine as much and he all around seems like a much happier dog. This is the most conservative approach at this time as Duke is still mobile and the medicine (although its expensive) is worth every penny.

2) If you'll notice in the films his femoral heads have already started to degenerate. They are no longer round at 13 months and as far as I can tell there is nothing that will stop or reverse this process. His gait (the way he walks) is awkward to say the least. His hind legs seem to swing outward as he walks and when he rises from laying down he basically does a push-up and swings his hind legs underneath him.

Because this is a degenerative disease there will come a time where he will be lame and immobile. I believe the key is to lengthen this mobility stage as long as possible by keeping his muscles and ligaments as strong and tight to prevent further subluxing (moving out of the joint) of the femoral head.  Low impact work outs are key. (Swimming and walking in water are the best low impact workouts period)

3) At the point he does become lame, surgical treatment is the only option other than a wheelchair.

The wheelchair to me does not seem like the better of the 2 options because it seems your just replacing one degenerative joint for another. Duke has been walking on his two front legs for over a year and in that time has developed a chest that would make Sly Stallone in his prime look like a school girl. I am not a doctor and I am sure there are others schools of thought on this but I see the elbows degenerating at a higher rate and then I would have a dog with 4 bad joints instead of 2.

Two types of surgical treatment are available for these dogs and these are Total Hip Arthroplasty and Femoral Head Osteotomey.  

     A) Femoral head osteotomey is when the femoral heads are cut off and the surrounding tissue tightens up if it is left immobilized for a certain period of time. This is called a girdle stone in humans and is pretty commonly used in people and successful. I spoke with one an orthopedic surgeon for people today about the surgical treatments and his view was that while a femoral head oste

Duke...looks like you got cut off.  What did you decide to do?  I have had exteme experience with both...in one dog....My very first SchH dog had three THR and one FHO (right hind quarter 2 THR and end up with a final FHO on that side and left hip 1 THR).  Long story....BUT still curious to know what you chose?  My suggestion is choose your orthopedic surgeon wisely no matter what. 

Karmen