What a saga! Sounds similar to what happened to a 7 year old dog I bred who came up very lame a day and a half after playing with another dog. The local vets (Westchester NY) originally said he needed two!!!!! ACL repairs. The ortho specialists said he had some kind of immune mediated arthritis. Here is the kicker. He had a negative result from the in-house Lyme test. I said treat him any way for a month with antibiotics. It's cheap and harmless. Everyone poo pooed that idea. So after much dollars on x-rays, and expensive tests, and no clear diagnosis another Lyme test was done. Positive for Lyme! Now the dog is on antibiotics.
I don't know where you live, but my feeling about dogs here in the northeast is when a dog starts to limp one month of doxycycline is the way to go in so many cases AND if you read the info on those in house snap
Lyme tests, you will insist on a trial of doxy.
I could tell you another story about a puppy one day shy of a year bred by me who ended up with two elbow repairs, one on an asymptomatic elbow and no evidence of a problem on x-rays. (The x-rays were sent to Cornell). The in house snap test for Lyme was negative. But that story would be too long.

SO TRUE….we need to get these vets under control. They don't have to carry malpractice, and they are so smug whenever you question them about anything. AND they ALWAYS get paid, even if they do something wrong or unnecessary…

Definitely go after the vet…more vets need to know us breeders are holding them accountable.

I won't even sell a pup to a client until I interview their vet. They are all defensive, but I don't care…I won't deal with their stupid decisions later, that they think the breeder should pay for, when in fact, they exacerbated a situation, misdiagnosed, or gave wrong advice. Some even lie to clients, give them false hopes, loving to be the "superman" that will "save their pup" (even if they know the surgery will harm the pup) I had this happen with 2 vets that did surgery on supposed intersucception (sp?) From my experience, the rate of those who survive this surgery is VERY low, yet the vets do it without telling the client the risks…but if they don't do the surgery, and allow the breeder to instead replace the pup or help with the costs, THEY DONT MAKE ANY MONEY...and the puppy owner is in debt for thousands and thousands of dollars sometimes. Its so AWFUL.

Yay! Let's bash the vets now! It's such a fun game. When we have to deal with breeders like "the one who shall not be named" and worse, do you wonder why breeders are held in such low esteem?

I really HATE the Vet bashing.....There was once a time that wonderful and generous Veterinarians would offer help and great advise to the posters on this forum. That is no longer the case due to all the "Vet Bashing" that goes on so frequently. Too bad that we all lost such great veterinary support due to the lack of respect.

Once again, and only my opinion. When we allow dirty deceptive breeders to continue to do what they do. No one will want to associate themselves with the entire breeding group. We all end up paying for that in the end. No wonder they left the forum.
The one or two bad apples do spoil the whole bunch in this case.

Maybe we need to be more clear with our buyers....calls US first before you go to the vet. It's great the pup is OK, but sad the family is out $700 and if I were them, I wouldn't trust that vet again. It's not vet bashing, but who wants to work with that kind of vet. I've had experiences with vets who were GREAT but charged too much for what they wanted to do, so I dumped them. Pure economics.

Even if the family does call you first and even if you suggest a line of treatment, if the treating veterinarian says otherwise, what is the poor dog owner supposed to do. If you have been breeding dogs for many,many years, and if you have half a brain, you learn a lot. Our experience and expertise in many aspects of veterinary medicine should not be underestimated. I am sure that starting the first year of breeding dogs, you, like me, researched everything medical that came up with your dogs. When you are about to put your bitch through a labor and delivery, you make yourself very,very prepared. When you had your first experience with a limping puppy, you researched that, etc.,etc. many veterinarians have no reproductive experience. Many have little experience with any but boiler plate dog problems. And sorry to say, when a breeder suggests a benign treatment for the first occurrence of a problem, that can be very threatening to a veterinarian . . .Which is why many vets don't want to have breeders in their practice. With that said, I have had positive experiences working with wonderful veterinarians over the many years I have had dogs. The best are dog breeders themselves.

I am very thankful for my own vet. He asked to have the initial x-rays and report sent to him. He told me the placement for initial the hip x-rays was done incorrectly, but even so, the hips looked good or excellent to him. He looked at all the other x-rays and saw no issues at all. He suggested the initial x-rays be sent on to Michigan State(their comment - x-rays normal for age) for a second opinion and to get pup in to him to do OFA's. He was polite and respectful to the family when they finally drove the 1 1/2 hours and brought pup in to him. They even commented how much they liked him. My own vet deserves a reward for how well he helped in this situation. I'm also very thankful that most vets are not like this pup's . The family refuses to switch vets which I kindly suggested they do. I agree that the best vets are breeders themselves, all the vets in my office show, compete in performance and breed. It does make a difference. I'm so thankful the hips came out excellent. I now realize not all vets are the same.

Story Time! A true story from a very, very reputable Akita breeder who happens to be a good friend of mine. A young couple had recently lost their Akita who had suffered from Pemphigus his entire life. They approached Lynn who sold them a puppy.

Tra la la, the young couple (as instructed) conducted a health check on their wonderful new puppy (8 weeks old). Horror, the pup was severely Dysplastic and needed surgery immediately. Fortunately the couple called Lynn.

Hold the presses. Bring me that puppy. Lynn paid for their gas and one night in a hotel, she also paid for the x-rays. So off they all go to Lynn's vet. The pup was x-rayed. The vet spent an hour explaining to the couple what hip dysplasia was, and used x-rays to show the couple photos of dysplastic hips. After an hour, he put up the x-rays from their pup. They gasped and changed vets.

Fast forward 2 years - OFA Excellent!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Moral of the story? "Greed Happens"