Lame Labrador

[Fools Motto]

My step mother has a lab dog. He is now about 14 months old. The first problem is that he is, shall we say, not the most intelligent of the species! Although gone to dog training classes, he either hasn't understood a word, or thinks my SM is a person who he can walk all over (Which to a dog is probably true!) My father, well, lets just say i doubt the dog even knows he exists, but then my father has that effect on most animals!!! Currently both SM and F are away on holiday, so DimDog is with me. Great.
Right from the word go I have always told SM that he will be a big dog.. ''Oh no, he can't be, his parents were both small and dainty''... he clearly has not taken after them. Then boundries were never set and made, so he has got away with things like taking whats not his, escaping, not coming to call, and general bad manners like jumping up and trying to hump anything, live, moving or non living and still! (see that as either a grandchild, or a log!!) They didn't want to castrate him at first, thought he was 'a very good specimen of his breed'.. I told them otherwise. Several times. Several more times. Then again. Dog then had a retained testicle, and that caused a problem. Got operated on, and that caused a problem for a while as he kept bleeding, and then wouldn't leave the darn thing alone. He wore a lampshade collar, which would have been the most useful thing had he been put into a group of hooliganing thugs.. everything and everyone was scattered! In doing so he cut his head.. more bleeding. Then that was finally sorted, and he escaped.. and would not come back to any amount of anything. It is his worst thing, recall doesn't happen, and DimDog hates to be caught. He has ended up on the main road, which, I suspect is where the current problem may stem from.

He has been lame for 2 weeks now. He has got no better. He has been to the vets, had x-rays, nothing broken. Been on A-B's and pain killers, and had restricted exercise. I either suspect he has been hit by a car, and got a muscle tear (shoulder) or due to his size and dopiness, got arthritis. BUT, is this even possible to have and not show up on x-rays? And his age? Could it be a labrador genetic fault?
Would you suggest he should be scanned?


BTW, He does have a name and it isn't really DimDog ... although it would suit him!!

 

[CorvusCorax]

Did they x-ray the hips and elbows specifically, labs can suffer from hip and elbow dysplasia, it is usually genetic (were the sire and dam health tested?) and genetically bad hips and elbows can be made worse with over-exertion in youth (jumping in and out of car, on and off furniture, up and down stairs, too much high impact exercise on hard surfaces as a puppy).

 

[Fools Motto]

They only x-rayed the front legs, elbows and shoulders. Nothing has been mentioned about his hips. He has come from parents who were tested, and all I got was 'both passed' when i asked that question.
i am right in thinking he should be scanned as x-rays show boney changes/breaks but scans would give more of an idea?
He has been too boisterous from the word go, so I suspect he did do too much too soon and now he has finished growing, it shows??

 

[s4sugar]

You don't get pass or fail for x rays but get scores. You can look up the parents names on the KC website -http://www.thekennelclub.org.uk/services/public/mateselect/test/Default.aspx

 

[CorvusCorax]

As above, you get scores, the best being 0:0 the worst being a total of 108 (I think - def low 100s). Very uneven scores are also undesirable. Elbows go from 0-3 with 0 being the best.
The BVA runs the scheme and a panel of vets judge from x-rays the degree of dysplasia. The dog has to be positioned properly for an accurate plate to be taken.

You could also ask for an x-ray of his back.