Hi all,
Bred a litter a couple of years ago, at 7 months one pup had slight intermittent front limping, orthopaedic specialist diagnosed
Mild synovitis of the right elbow joint and medial coronoid process disease. They did arthroscopic surgery to inspect his elbow joints, but once in there they decided to do nothing as it was very mild and instead decided to use crate rest and diet to see how if that would sort it out. The owners did what the specialist told them etc etc. The dog has not limped since. Now here's the issue, I asked that for my own records could they please have his hips and elbows scored which they have done he came back with excellent hips and normal elbows !!!!!. When the specialist and the radiologist were asked how can he have normal elbows their reply was his elbow problem would not show up on the elbow xray that is done for scoring, well this opens a whole can of worms, if they are correct just how many dogs are give a normal elbow rating when in fact they may very well have issues that do not show up, has any one heard of a dog having the above and getting a normal elbow score, all seems rather odd to me.
I was also thinking maybe the diagnosis wasn't correct? Can always call Dr Keller and specifically ask him about the x-ray, giving the history, and get his opinion.
I am not in the States, But I will try to get the original xrays e-mailed through to Dr Keller these were orthopaedic specialists who did the original diagnosis, and both they and the specialist Radiologist say this type of elbow problem would not show up on the scoring x ray as they position the elbow differently, which if correct is actually quite scary , how many dogs have normal elbows on a score sheet but in reality don't have perfect elbows.
