One of my dogs had to have knee surgery performed. We ended up choosing the BC ortho vet instead of our vet (our vet actually suggested it as well). Our dog has done very well. We definitely spent a lot of money for the surgery but feel it was worth it in the end.

On a personal note, I am a physician who is a subspecialist. This may not be an apples to apples comparison, so take it for what you want, but I would always choose the specialist over the general doc every time. Of course, I am biased, since I am a subspecialist but I know the training I went through. When I finished my ophthalmology training, I felt pretty darn confident in my skills in all the sub aspects of the eye. Once I finished my fellowship, I realized my general ophthalmology training had only hit the tip of the iceberg, and there was so much more to learn, and skills to obtain.

Knees are extremely complicated, go with the certified vet.

My brother in law is a veterinary surgeon and owns a practice of five vets. He told me he would never operate on a knee and he considers himself to be pretty ambitious with his skills.

Bull Mastiff is a big dog. Our GW Pyranees required two acl repairs and what our vet told us is that he could fix them, but the procedure he could do would be far less than ideal for a dog of that size.

He referred us to a BC specialist that was able to do an different, more effective procedure and the mutt recovered nicely and lived the rest of his life with no limitations.

As I recall we paid about 5k per knee, but this was awhile back.

Appreciate yours and everyones comments.
We will be patient and get that specialist evaluation and go from there. I would like things done right the first time!!!
Thanks!

Also-has anyone heard of a double TPLO(tibial plateau leveling osteotomy) done at the same time to reduce cost? I think I have only seen a 2-3 month wait between.
thanks again!