Belgian Malinois Puppy Health Guarantee
At Stoneridge Belgian Malinois, we put careful breeding decisions, breed-appropriate health screening, and veterinary care at the heart of raising our puppies. We take these steps to give every puppy a healthy start. Because even careful breeding cannot prevent every health concern, our guarantee provides clear support when a covered condition arises.
We provide two independent protections: congenital and inherited coverage through your puppy’s second birthday, and 14-day protection for qualifying illness present before handover or acquired during delivery arranged by us. For qualifying congenital or inherited conditions, we cover diagnosis expenses up to the purchase price and separately refund the full purchase price, whether you keep or return your puppy.
For arrival illness, we pay qualifying diagnosis and treatment costs for one illness episode, up to the purchase price. Diagnostic coverage can include multiple qualifying conditions and continues after a refund. Timely referrals allow extra time for specialist confirmation, including documented appointment delays.
Breeding and Preparing Your Puppy for Home
How We Breed
Health and temperament guide our breeding decisions. Our parent dogs are purebred, AKC-registered Belgian Malinois dogs, with breed-specific health evaluation informing our choices.
Recommended health screening for Belgian Malinois focuses on radiographic hip and elbow evaluations and board-certified ophthalmologist eye examinations, alongside targeted DNA testing for recognized inherited neurological, retinal, and juvenile cardiac mutations. Reviewing these areas and wider family history helps reduce the risk of painful joint disease, vision loss, and inherited disorders in active working and companion dogs.
How We Raise and Care for Our Puppies
Our puppies grow up in our home with daily handling and gentle introductions to people, household sounds, and everyday experiences.
From birth, each puppy has a care calendar and folder recording feeding, vaccinations, deworming, veterinary visits and procedures. We add AKC paperwork, pedigree, microchip details and individual care needs as available, then review these with you.
Preparing for Pickup or Delivery
Before departure, our veterinarian examines your puppy and assesses fitness for the planned journey.
Your puppy travels in a spacious, secure, well-ventilated crate or carrier, selected for their comfort throughout the journey. We coordinate food, water, comfort and breaks. Your puppy travels with transition food, their folder and calendar, and a mother-scented blanket where suitable. We confirm handover, arrival and contact details and explain care during the journey home.
What We Cover and How We Help
Congenital and Inherited Conditions
Congenital conditions are present at birth, although discovered later. Inherited conditions arise from a dog’s genetic background; the categories can overlap.
These examples include common concerns in Belgian Malinois dogs and other recognized inherited disorders. Coverage includes, but is not limited to, these examples. Other congenital or likely inherited conditions qualify under the same requirements.
| Condition | What it affects | How it is assessed |
|---|---|---|
| Hip Dysplasia (HD) | Abnormal hip joint development causing joint laxity, cartilage wear, pain, and progressive osteoarthritis. | Veterinary orthopedic examination and standardized pelvic radiographs evaluated by a specialist or recognized registry. |
| Elbow Dysplasia (ED) | Developmental abnormalities of the elbow joint leading to forelimb lameness, discomfort, and degenerative joint disease. | Orthopedic examination and flexed/extended elbow radiographs or computed tomography (CT) reviewed by a specialist. |
| Hereditary Cataracts | Clouding within the lens of the eye that can impair vision or progress toward blindness. | Slit-lamp biomicroscopy and ophthalmic examination by a board-certified veterinary ophthalmologist (ACVO). |
| Progressive Retinal Atrophy (PRA) | Gradual degeneration of light-sensitive retinal photoreceptor cells, leading to night blindness and progressive vision loss. | Board-certified ophthalmologist fundus examination, electroretinography (ERG), and supporting genetic testing where applicable. |
| Idiopathic Epilepsy | Recurrent seizures of suspected inherited origin without an underlying structural brain lesion or metabolic cause. | Veterinary neurologist evaluation, seizure history, bloodwork, and advanced brain imaging or cerebrospinal fluid analysis as needed. |
| Spongy Degeneration with Cerebellar Ataxia (SDCA1 / SDCA2) | Severe inherited degeneration of cerebellar brain tissue causing early loss of balance, tremors, and uncoordinated movement. | Veterinary neurological examination combined with targeted DNA mutation testing and histopathology or advanced imaging. |
| Cardiomyopathy and Juvenile Mortality (CJM) | Inherited heart muscle disorder in Belgian Shepherd breeds causing early cardiac failure, weakness, and juvenile mortality. | Veterinary cardiology evaluation, echocardiography, and YARS2 genetic testing alongside clinical findings. |
| Degenerative Myelopathy (DM) | Progressive spinal cord white-matter degeneration that causes hindlimb weakness and loss of coordination, typically in adulthood. | Veterinary neurologist clinical assessment excluding compressive spinal disease, supported by SOD1 genetic testing. |
Complex conditions such as hip dysplasia and idiopathic epilepsy involve multiple genes and environmental factors, while a DNA carrier or risk result alone does not confirm active clinical disease.
An appropriate specialist must diagnose the condition and support a clinical opinion that it is congenital or likely inherited. Absolute genetic proof is not required. The condition must be moderate or severe, or require ongoing treatment or surgery. Carrier/risk results without clinical disease and minor findings resolving on their own do not qualify.
How to Make a Congenital or Inherited Claim
For either claim type, email info@stoneridgebelgianmalinois.com. We normally reply within 24 hours, always within 48 hours, identifying missing necessary records together. We email the final decision within three business days of complete records, including our veterinarian’s review. Records already on file count.
- Visit your veterinarian. Obtain an assessment and, where needed, a written specialist referral identifying the suspected condition.
- Send the referral promptly. Specialist confirmation is ordinarily due by the second birthday. Email the referral within seven calendar days of receipt and no later than that birthday to obtain 30 additional calendar days for evaluation and confirmation.
Documented clinic delays qualify for further extensions. Send evidence of the earliest suitable appointment; we record a revised date covering the visit, testing and report preparation. Further documented clinic/laboratory delays preserve eligibility; forward updates promptly. Extensions cover the referred condition, not unrelated concerns first suspected afterward.
- Send complete clinical records. Provide identity and purchase details, specialist diagnosis, supported congenital/likely inherited opinion, severity or treatment needs, relevant tests and applicable referral/delay evidence.
- Request your benefits. For your one-time purchase-price refund, choose to keep or return your puppy. Send itemized invoices for diagnostic reimbursement. For a later qualifying condition, follow the same clinical and reporting requirements and submit its invoices against your remaining diagnostic allowance. Missing invoices do not delay a supported refund.
Diagnosis Costs
We reimburse documented, medically necessary examinations, specialist consultations, imaging, laboratory tests and other testing used to establish qualifying congenital or inherited diagnoses, up to your puppy’s purchase price in total per dog. Necessary tests can qualify even when an individual result is negative.
This allowance can cover more than one qualifying condition through your puppy’s second birthday, including applicable referral extensions. Receiving a refund does not end diagnostic coverage. Later qualifying conditions and invoices can use the remaining balance; they do not create a new allowance. Each condition must meet the same clinical and reporting requirements. Ongoing treatment for congenital or inherited conditions is not covered.
Your Purchase-Price Refund
A confirmed qualifying congenital or inherited claim receives a full refund of the puppy’s purchase price, regardless of treatment cost. Diagnostic and arrival-illness payments do not reduce it.
| Your choice | Refund | Your puppy |
|---|---|---|
| Keep your puppy | Full purchase-price refund | Stays with your family |
| Permanent health-related return | Full purchase-price refund, plus company-arranged pickup and initial examination | Returns permanently to our care |
You may receive one full purchase-price refund per dog. The diagnostic allowance applies under either choice and remains available after the refund, subject to its remaining balance and coverage deadlines. Later qualifying conditions do not provide another refund. Diagnostic invoices support their reimbursement but do not delay a supported refund.
Refunds are issued within 1–3 calendar days after written eligibility confirmation, complete clinical records and your choice. For returns, refunds follow within 1–3 calendar days after handover, with records complete. Approved diagnostic reimbursements are issued within 1–3 calendar days of approval and necessary invoices. Payment-provider settlement may take longer.
Health-return pickup is completed within 7–10 calendar days of written confirmation and receipt of transport details. We confirm the collection date and pay transport and the initial examination separately from claim payments. Additional company-paid treatment follows a veterinary plan agreed before handover.
Illness Around Delivery
For company-arranged delivery, veterinarian-confirmed infectious illness qualifies when signs first appear within 14 calendar days after handover and evidence supports likely illness before handover or during transport.
For one qualifying illness episode, we reimburse documented, medically necessary diagnosis and treatment costs up to your puppy’s purchase price. The treatment course can include related specialist visits, medication, surgery and necessary follow-up. This allowance is separate from the congenital/inherited refund and diagnostic allowance.
How to Make an Arrival-Illness Claim
- Seek veterinary care. Complete the initial examination within three days of arrival. Do not wait for our reply before obtaining urgent treatment.
- Notify us. Email info@stoneridgebelgianmalinois.com within 48 hours of symptoms, or as soon as reasonably possible in an emergency.
- Send complete records. Provide identity and purchase details, examination report, diagnosis, tests, symptom timeline, veterinarian’s likely-exposure assessment, treatment plan and itemized invoices.
New exposure after handover does not qualify. Uncertain timing or cause is reviewed with your veterinarian; absence of symptoms at handover alone does not prove absence of illness. A late checkup alone does not automatically void arrival protection or unrelated congenital/inherited coverage; we assess available evidence.
Related infections from the same handover or journey share one arrival-illness allowance. This covers one qualifying episode and treatment course, which may require several visits, invoices or installments. Approved arrival reimbursements are issued within 1–3 calendar days of approval and necessary invoices.
Later invoices under either approved protection receive a decision within three business days of complete supporting records and payment within 1–3 calendar days after approval. Each benefit has its own separate limit. Payments under one benefit do not reduce another, and the same expense cannot be reimbursed twice.
Your Responsibilities
- Arrange the first vet visit within three days. Bring the health folder and calendar so your veterinarian can continue age-appropriate vaccinations, deworming and ongoing care.
- Keep records and follow care advice. Maintain veterinary records and follow your veterinarian’s recommendations.
- Keep us informed. Follow the appropriate checklist, forward documented-delay updates and provide accurate details for any qualifying return.
We care about our dogs throughout their lives and want every puppy to be treated with kindness, patience and respect.