Debbie Meier Posted June 3, 2009 Report Share Posted June 3, 2009 Does anyone know what the rate of elbow dysplasia is in border collies? Is its significant? Is one population more greatly affected than another (show, working, etc.?). I have to say that elbow dysplasia is not something that has been on my radar as being a significant problem in the breed, but maybe I've been asleep at the switch and so missed something.... J. I was just wondering the same thing, also in regards to hips. The other thing I was wondering is if there is any deviations in the rates of affliction (not via x-ray, but pain associations) when comparing dogs that are raised in more of a pet/suburb situations participating in activities that have more trauma, pavement, concrete, hard ground vs. those that are raised out in rural settings that have more natural footing and natural exercise. I bring this up only because my old border collie/lab cross Amber had terrible joint problems when we lived in Wisconsin. We were not allowed to have dogs in the house (atleast that they knew of) and she spent a lot of time in a concrete run, I used to give her regular pain meds. Within a few months of living here on the farm her issues cleared up, the only thing we can think of is no concrete and more exercise but less intense. Currently none of our runs are concrete, I hesitate to put anyone on concrete after seeing the change in her, and I know concrete can cause problems under horses. I know my joints ached when I spent my days standing on concrete, makes me wonder how much environments that we are unaware of effect our dogs. Just brings a memory of a show about the builders of they pyramids that was on PBS the other night, they examined the bones and found stress changes to the skeletons from the hard labor and heavy loads on the body. Just a thought, our foot wear has evolved to account for the ground conditions that we have created, our dogs just have to deal, maybe some of the dysplasia issues have always been there just not manifested to the degree we see them now due to the conditions not being as taxing. Anyway, just some thoughts, kinda intune with injury rates on artifical turf vs. natural grass, etc., not sure if there is any difference, but I have heard of some research. Is it possible that the dysplasia issues are part of the dogs body evolving, or is it due to the need of it to evolve? There I go, driving everyone nuts with my Why crap again . Yeah yeah yeah, don't ask why just breed away from it I can't help it, it's the way I think Deb Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lenajo Posted June 3, 2009 Report Share Posted June 3, 2009 Concrete can certainly make a dog worse if it's already arthritic, but it can't make them that way by itself. Our dogs have been on concrete for years and we have very little arthritis compared with other dog owners here I compare with. #1 reason may be better genetics, but also good feeding (not overweight especially, but also quality of food) and not allowing your dogs to act like fools in the kennels. They don't need to be jumping on and off their houses for one, and pacers are either underexercised or undertrained. Concrete is a neccessity in this climate to control parasites. I've never had a dog with elbow problems at all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Liz P Posted June 4, 2009 Report Share Posted June 4, 2009 I've never heard of a BC with ED and the ortho vets I know say they have never seen one. They have seen plenty with OCD (shoulder) though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
herdcentral Posted June 4, 2009 Report Share Posted June 4, 2009 According to OFA about 1.3% of BCs have some form of elbow dysplasia, with a very low portion of this being grade 3. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
juliepoudrier Posted June 4, 2009 Report Share Posted June 4, 2009 What I wonder about though, is the validity of that statistic. It presupposes that the dogs being tested (or people who chose to test) for ED are representative of the general population of border collies, and I wonder if that's really the case. In other words, how are they extrapolating (or are they?) their data from the dogs they've seen radiographs on to the border collie population in general? For example, if most conformation and some sports breeders send radiographs to OFA, but most working and pet breeders do not, then can the 1.3% estimation be applied to all border collies? In other words, if a large random sample of border collies from all walks of life were tested, would that statistic still hold, or would it end up being higher or lower? I know no one can actually answer that question, but it makes me wonder about the true incidence and whether routine testing for ED is necessary (since it's been coming up a lot lately and more and more people seem to be suggesting that dogs need to be tested for ED routinely). J. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdarling Posted June 4, 2009 Report Share Posted June 4, 2009 HERE is the result I got when I searched for anything but normal elbow results on Border Collies. I think that answers the question. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eileen Stein Posted June 4, 2009 Report Share Posted June 4, 2009 What I wonder about though, is the validity of that statistic. It presupposes that the dogs being tested (or people who chose to test) for ED are representative of the general population of border collies, and I wonder if that's really the case. In other words, how are they extrapolating (or are they?) their data from the dogs they've seen radiographs on to the border collie population in general? They're not extrapolating at all. The 1.3% incidence is simply based on the number classed as abnormal out of the 1488 border collies they've evaluated. The ABCA Health & Genetics Committee does not consider elbow dysplasia to be a significant problem in the breed, and it's not one of the diseases for which they recommend testing breeding stock. I've never had or known a border collie with elbow dysplasia. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
juliepoudrier Posted June 4, 2009 Report Share Posted June 4, 2009 Thanks Eileen. I've been seeing more and more comments about testing for ED here on this forum and was wondering if I had missed something, but it sounds like another of those tests just being used for marketing purposes without a great basis in actual need. J. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
herdcentral Posted June 4, 2009 Report Share Posted June 4, 2009 It seems some breeds naturally have a very low incidence of ED. It is interesting to checkout the incidence for the various breeds on the OFA website. Where I live it is interesting to note that it is easy to get a show bred BC from parents that are elbow scored with nearly all show bred animals tested, while extremely difficult to get an ACD from elbow scored parents. ACDS appear to have a much higher incidence of ED and I know at of least 10 including one of mine whereas years ago I had never even heard of ED despite being very much involved with lots of working bred ACDS. I dont know if this has to do with the rise of the show bred un tested ACD. ED is usually much more catastrophic than hip problems to a working dog so I guess in a true working bred dog this problem is probably automatically not favoured in breeding programs. ED also tends to be more common in big dogs and dogs with more tank like bodies. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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