Hip Prelims - Page 1

 What are the benefits of doing hip/elbow prelims at 1 year  instead of waiting until the dog is 24 months.

Thanks!

I think it depends on what your intension is for the dog.  If you NEED a working or breeding prospect then you might want to do them early.  If done early you can always go to plan "B" if the hips are not so good.  That way you are not investing time and money into a dog that won't fit what you need.  You would not want to continue to train a dog for competiton if you knew at 12 months that he had bad hips and you would not want to use a dog for breeding later down the line if you knew at 12 months that he had bad hips.  Depends on what you want from the dog really.

Vickie

www.PowerHausKennels.com

I am with Vicki on this.

If hips are bad at 1 yr, they are going to be bad at 2 yrs.

Something from the OFA website:

""A recent publication* compared the reliability of the preliminary evaluation hip grade phenotype with the 2 year old evaluation in dogs and there was 100% reliability for a preliminary grade of excellent being normal at 2 years of age (excellent, good, or fair). There was 97.9% reliability for a preliminary grade of good being normal at 2 years of age, and 76.9% reliability for a preliminary grade of fair being normal at 2 years of age. Reliability of preliminary evaluations increased as age at the time of preliminary evaluation increased, regardless of whether dogs received a preliminary evaluation of normal hip conformation or HD. For normal hip conformations, the reliability was 89.6% at 3-6 months, 93.8% at 7-12 months, and 95.2% at 13-18 months. These results suggest that preliminary evaluations of hip joint status in dogs are generally reliable. However, dogs that receive a preliminary evaluation of fair or mild hip joint conformation should be reevaluated at an older age (24 months).""""

So, if you have normal hips at 12 months, then you will have a 93% chance of having normal at 2 yrs.

Again I would have to agree specially if you are working the dog or plan on adding the dog to a breeding program.

Nowdays many breeder request that you prelimb early so they also know what is goin on with their puppy for warranty reasons.

If it is a pet then prelimbing at a year would be good if that is when you have your pet spayed or neutered to save money and have it all done at once.

EK

I am planning on using the USCA "a" stamp program at twelve months for those very reasons. I will also do an OFA at 24 months. I would feel secure after both evaluations.

Michele and Pharaoh