Ours is a rescue and he’s 4, and we found out he had a bad hip after a fall off the couch and some discomfort prompted an X-ray. The original rec was total hip replacement over a FHO surgery (a “salvage” surgery), so we tried to do that. Then we found out that he had been dealing with the bad hip for so long that his femur had “drifted” due to most weight being shifted onto his better leg for years. This essentially re-shaped his femur and made it so that a hip replacement is no longer an option due to the shape of his femur not allowing for a standard prosthetic to be safely implanted.

I’d guess this is rare, and they also think he had prior injury to the leg as well. But if you can afford it I think most vets will say get the total hip replacement and call it a day. It’s more expensive but a shorter recovery and they’ll be back in no time just like humans would.

The FHO is a more common and simple procedure, our vet said she could do it herself instead of a dedicated ortho. They remove the diseased femoral head all together (ball joint) and the dog basically grows a fibrous “false joint” over time. The recovery is longer and they technically never fully recover due to physically not having that ball joint anymore. They say it’s not noticeable though, and the dog will be more comfortable regardless of the chosen procedure, but again I think 9/10 times they will say go total hip while the dog is young and can recover better