Heart & Eye Clearances

Heart and eye clearances are important health assessments for Golden Retrievers and many other dog breeds as they are more susceptible to hereditary heart and eye conditions. Having a specialist examine the parent dogs and clear them of any issues is a great way to reduce risks of the offspring to have any inheritable issues in the future, and shows the Breeder is committed to doing the right thing by their animals.

Heart Clearances

Golden Retrievers are susceptible to certain hereditary heart conditions, such as sub-aortic stenosis and dilated cardiomyopathy. Heart clearances help identify dogs with heart issues and prevent them from being used for breeding. This clearance involves a Cardiologist listening to the dog’s heart for any abnormalities and providing a report following their examination. This report should generally be one page and fairly straightforward in its results.

Eye Clearances

Hereditary eye conditions, such as progressive retinal atrophy (PRA), cataracts, and retinal dysplasia, can lead to vision impairment and blindness. Eye clearances identify dogs with these conditions and allow breeders to make informed breeding decisions. We take our breeding dogs down to a specialist in Brisbane where they conduct a number of examinations to clear them of hereditary eye concerns. This examination is conducted every year to ensure no new issues pop up in the future.

Why Have These Tests Done?

At Sunshine Coast Golden Retrievers, we believe that completing all recommended testing and putting our dogs health and well-being at the forefront of all our decisions is a bare minimum for any responsible breeders. We ensure all our breeding dogs undergo every recommended health test and return adequate results before deciding 100% to add them to our breeding program. Sure, this means we put a much higher time and cost investment into our program, but it also means we know we are producing the healthiest and happiest babies we possibly can, and that they will live long and happy lives with their forever families. Investing in the security of knowing our babies are healthy has been the best decision we have ever made and we will continue to make this decision over and over again.