Elbow dysplasia is a group of developmental orthopedic conditions causing chronic joint pain in large breed dogs, requiring early intervention for best welfare outcomes.
Elbow dysplasia causes significant chronic pain from abnormal joint development that progresses to osteoarthritis even with treatment. Young dogs developing elbow dysplasia experience forelimb pain during growth - a formative period when play, social interaction, and exercise are critical to normal development. Early surgical intervention when appropriate reduces pain and slows arthritis progression, substantially improving long-term welfare outcomes compared to delayed treatment. Dogs with established elbow OA require lifelong multimodal pain management including NSAIDs, rehabilitation therapy, and environmental modification. The strongly heritable nature of elbow dysplasia makes breeding program health screening essential - affected animals should not be bred, and screening programs in high-risk breeds reduce the prevalence of this painful heritable condition.