The Brittany Forum

Waldo

Hi All, this might sound like a simple question, but how do you interpret "hip scores"?
What is a good score and what is a bad score?
Thanks,
Waldo

doganjo · Posted: Wed Apr 01, 2009 11:05 am Post subject:

Hi Waldo, I don't know how the Australian KC scores them but in the UK they are given a number for each hip and the lower the better - as I said in another post zero indicates no dysplasia while 53 indicates severe dysplasia.
I've attached Allez's hip score certificate fro information. All the terms can be googled for an explanation of them. A lot depends however on the vet being good at positioning the dog for the x-ray. Some vets have a great deal of experience, others rarely see cases of HD
Hope this helps
Annie

Click to download file
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Annie

Handle every situation like a dog, if you can't eat it or play with it, just pee on it and walk away

sallie · Guest

I see that Allez was over a year old when this was done and a fantastic hip score he has too.

What should we (none breeder) look for that would indicate the puppy would/was suffer from hip dysplasia... in previous posts i think Patricia said that it was hard to detect under one year of age. Are there any safe guards for the buyer, obviously we need a good fit dog to work with and a year is an awful lot of time, effort, training and money to invest in a dog that is 'sub-standard' and unable to fill the role it was bought for. Can we for instance claim a refund, do we report the HD to the KC and/or the breeder, are there then restrictions put on the breeding of both parents' of the pup?

More importantly what signs do we look for in a pup as i have never come across a case of HD?

Not that i would trade Monet for the world and if he was unfortunate to have HD then he would become my full time companion (which he is already) and not trained for hunting.

doganjo · Posted: Wed Apr 01, 2009 4:42 pm Post subject:

To be honest, HD is not normally a big issue in our breed, although personally I have never and would never breed with any dog above the breed average (Currently 17 - total for the two hips). But then this is a skewed figure since a fairly low number of dogs in our breed have been scored. That said they are a front ended breed (forehand centre of gravity) and as such even the higher scored dogs may not show any symptoms. The symptoms described by Waldo didn't indicate HD to me but patella luxation, so I was foxed on this one. Severely dysplastic dogs would be in pain and show it by their temperament, but as I said in a previous post, there are varying degrees of dysplasia, requiring varying forms of treatment and management. I think it is too late by the time you have a puppy as you bond with it and work hard on training in that first year, as Sallie says. (HD cannot be tested until the dog is 12 months of age under KC regulations), so the only way a new owner can protect his investment is to ascertain the hip, scores of the parents, grandparents, and any siblings from previous litters, then manage the puppy's environment - feed properly, exercise on level surfaces, don't allow them to run up and down stairs etc. Thereafter it is down to Mother Nature.
_________________
Annie

Handle every situation like a dog, if you can't eat it or play with it, just pee on it and walk away

Patricia · Posted: Wed Apr 01, 2009 6:51 pm Post subject:

After 22 years and many experiences, and with the best will in the world, you cannot say you won't produce dysplastic dogs. They can crop up any time even with your available scored stock.
I have produced such a dog, a show Champion at that and sound, beautiful, whose parents, grand parents etc had good hips. To see him move you would have never said he had a high hip score.
I have imported over 18 years ago 2 dysplastic dogs, got rid of both, started again. As Goldie says, how can you tell how a pup will turn out?
All you can do is score what you have , you cannot force others to all do Xrays on a complete litter.
If you want guarantees, then, like I have done in the past, buy adults already done? Be careful with rearing, feeding, exercise etc...After all the years of BVA scoring, hip dysplasia is still present...
I remember a post somewhere where a new machine who would do away with the human error and a diffrent way of reading angles etc...
And for myself, a dog is not just a pair of hips alone, we need to see the whole picture ie, working ability, conformation, of course biddability and soundness. Not much to ask Rolling Eyes

Mugi · Bretonnier Joined: 24 Oct 2006 Posts: 1282

I know a dog with hips that are so high they are pretty much off the score (not a Brittany), to all intents and purposes she has no hip joints. She is also a Ch in her breed and has lovely movement (she will not be bred from btw) and she has no pain as there is no abnormal ball and socket to rub painfully. (One of the treatments for dysplasia is to removal the ball and allow a fibrous joint to develop with decent muscle tone needed to stabilise the joint).

Obviously I would not want to breed from a dog with high scores but ultimately if you have a dog who is scored high the most important consideration is ensuring a comfortable on-going life and that can be possible with (possibly) surgery and then a management of feeding and exercise. Not a great comfort with a symptomatic dog but worth a referral to an orthopaedic specialist.
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Sue, Chase and the non-Brittany boys - Brice & Piper. Pets first and foremost.

Never forgetting Mugi and Freddy

Waldo · Posted: Wed Apr 01, 2009 7:18 pm Post subject:

Thanks for the replies, I was just stuffing around on the web last night and was checking out my Annie's parentage and found the hip scores of what would be her grandfather on her mothers side and he had a AVA hipscore of 4:4 and elbow score of 1:1, didn't know if this was good, bad or indifferent. I guess it's not too bad then.
Thanks,
Waldo

Wyngold · Bretonnier Joined: 14 May 2007 Posts: 118

Compairatively...get the best hip scores you can breed from.
My personal preferance is to not use any dog with an AVA or BVA score higher than 8 per hip ie. 8/8
This score related to the breed norm around the world as "borderline" phenotype...or in a transitional state. Most all of the scientific literature states that the older the dog is at time of Radiograph (ie after growth plate closure; 16-18 months for dogs in the 40pound range) the most accurate the the prognastic outcome for that particular dogs future.

From a breeding standpoint....you want pedigree depth and breadth in terms of breeding. So a dog that has a good score with littermates with a good score and parents and grand parents with good scores enhance the probability that your lines are more genetically aligned to produce good hips. You are far less likely to achive a line of dogs with good hip if you only select individuals to breed from on a case by case basis.

I would prefer to use a dog with a score of 8/8 where the rest of the litter were good and parents good verses a dog that is the only one in its line radigraphed with a 1/1.

If you are a breeder who likes to do preliminary examinations so that you do not invest time or money in training or campaigning a dog that will later be defective....correlations have shown that an OFA Excellent (lower than 4/4) prelim at 4 months of age will most likely present dogs with normal hips at 2 years of age and for the rest of its adult life. PennHip states that any dog with a DI score of .60 as a 4 month old will likely be dysplastic as an adult....Dr. Slocum one of the researchers on the PennHip technique in the early days emphatically believes that breed "norms" aside...any Brittany with a pennHip score of .35 or greater
should be considered Dysplastic. I know that many only publish percentiles as the PennHip system does not pass of fail any dogs...but from knowledge of what has gone into the database (mostly dogs who could not "pass" OFA) percentiles tell you where you are in relation to the "others" and if many fail OFA are in PennHip then if you are in the 80% percentile are you the best of the worst???

Anyway scores are only relative to what you do with that information.
If you understand how the structural dynamics of pelvic angle relates to impact forces on the socket and how the dorsal rim bears weight you would avoid breeding dogs with pelvic angles steeper than 30 degrees.

You can take the information or discard as you see fit.
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Wyngold Britanys
Bend, OREGON, USA

gundoglover · Posted: Thu Apr 02, 2009 8:38 am Post subject:

Hi Waldo,
Yes, if the score is AVA (Australian Veterinary Association), then the lower the score the better (lowest possible is 0, highest possible 104, I think). Where the scores occur also matters: deviations in the first two components reflect laxity and are less worrying than scores in the other components which reflect bone deformation. However, you would have to inspect the actual certificate to see this. On the whole, total scores under 10 are considered very good no matter what the breed. However, the heritability of hip scores tends to be 25-40%. So breeding two low-hip-score dogs can still result in some puppies above the breed average, but it is still your best bet when trying to reduce the likelihood of producing dysplastic puppies.

Patricia · Posted: Thu Apr 02, 2009 8:52 am Post subject:

The way I see it is to know ALL the litter's score, which can be difficult to achieve considering many will never be bred from and/or go into pet homes. When you get back into French pedigrees( especially the old ones) you won't have a clue as to what their hips were.
Nowadays it is easier as the "A" "B" or "C" will be recorded and that is allowed in France. Though not a " C" score to win a CAC at the French Nationale and in other cases -which I would have to check back on-
So, we may check our breeding stock and encourage owners to do Xrays, but we still won't have the whole picture.
Only for myself, I would still prefer to have a dog a bit breed average than an undersize animal with lots of other faults who will not do what I require of it. In an ideal world, yes, by the time you're finished very few will be up to breeding!
I have known Brittanys with scores of 60- 70 be very sound. Fortunately for them, and which, by the way, does not mean they should be used in the breeding pool!!!!