This article was originally published in American Bulldog Review

Hip Certification Flip Flop

I feel the need to share the following data with my fellow Bulldoggers:

My Stomper dog recently passed his WST in California. He was not able to get his BST because of a previous injury to one of his hips. One hip X-rayed excellent, but the other was too injured to be rated. My next prospective candidate for the BST was my Mac the Slasher dog. I decided to get Mac and one other dog OFAed so they could be trained for the BST. Things looked pretty good at the vet’s. Mac’s X-ray looked very good. The vet was pretty sure he would get a good rating. The other dog’s X-ray was not as good as Mac’s but the vet thought that if he did not get a fair, he would get a borderline rating. Both X-rays were submitted to OFA. Several weeks later, I heard back from OFA. Surprise, surprise, OFA declared both dogs to be dysplastic! I was really surprised. My first thoughts were that if Mac was dysplastic, I would be happy to have a yard full of dysplastic dogs. I have not really seen that many X-rays, and the ones I saw were mostly dysplastic, but Mac’s X-ray looked very tight. Anyway, my vet got the notice the same day as I did, and she was livid! She called and suggested something was wrong with that diagnosis and that I should have Mac PennHipped. To top off this diagnosis, the dog that had looser hips got a better rating than Mac who OBVIOUSLY had tighter hips! Figure that one out!

I had Mac PennHipped and according to them he was not dysplastic. He did not come close to having the best PennHip for the breed, but was definitely rated non-dysplastic by them. His score was .45 and .52, with NO DJD, definitely within the parameters stated for non-dysplastic dogs.

There seems to be a big difference in the OFA and PennHip ratings! My main concern here is how many non-dysplastic dog were rated dysplastic by OFA? And how many of those dogs given a bad rating by OFA were culled, neutered or given away? And how many of those dogs culled had better working qualities than some that are being and will be bred? At the same time how many ABs that have certified good hips but do not have the desired working qualities are being bred because of their certified good hips? This is not the way to improve the breed!

I am not saying that every dog that OFA gives a bad rating to would be rated better by PennHip, just giving my personal experience with this matter. I would suggest that anyone that submits a "tight looking" X-ray to OFA and gets rejected to go ahead spend the extra bucks and have that dog PennHipped!

The ABA salutes both OFA and PennHip for their efforts in helping eradicate the crippling disease of hip dysplasia in our breed.

Also I would recommend all owners of dogs with OFA or PennHipp certified hips to have the mental qualities of their dogs evaluated and certified by the WABA by taking and passing the BST. Remember it is the total dog that is being bred not just the hips.

Casey Couturier, ABA President