Dr. Maro: Prehabilitative therapy helps pets stay strong
We’ve all heard of rehabilitative and physical therapies for humans and animals, but do you know about prehabilitative therapy?
If you have a pet who becomes a couch potato in the winter months or a hunting dog or sporting dog that goes out for weekend runs or that two-week hunting trip, your pet will surely benefit from the types of maintenance care and improved conditioning that prevents the need rehabilitative treatments that are often the result of injury. Many ligament tears and strains can be prevented by using the concepts I employ in my integrative practice.
I encourage all owners of pets and horses to apply the strategies of animal chiropractic care, athletic conditioning, massage, maintaining their pets’ strength and muscle tone and feeding a great diet to ward off the effects of aging and arthritis through pre-hab therapies.
Pre-hab applies the idea that before an injury or occurs, preventive care can keep your pet from enduring the serious effects of musculoskeletal injuries and degenerative joint diseases. And when injuries do occur, pre-hab care prior to surgery for an injury, leads to faster recovery and less muscle loss.
This is achieved through the application of hands-on treatments, such as therapeutic massage, physical therapy exercises (including underwater treadmill), laser treatments and strength and conditioning exercises can all lead to better post-surgical outcomes and in some cases even negate the need for surgical intervention.
In my office, my staff takes this application a step further to include diet and nutraceuticals, stimulation of the nervous system through acupuncture and helping the central nervous system maintain connections to muscle and nerves through animal manipulative therapies. All these treatments and more help pets build and maintain muscular strength and condition, by optimizing nervous system signaling.
These approaches not only prevent profound muscle atrophy through the disuse of an injured limb, but also help protect against injury to the opposite limb and speed recovery from surgery by maintaining muscle and function of the nervous system.
A sedentary pet who loses muscle mass and strength loses much more than the visible muscle. They also lose something called mitochondria which help power the cells and oxygenate tissues. Impaired mitochondria cannot help with healing and energy production and will lead to a pet experiencing greater inflammation during the healing phase.
Inflammation can lead to re-injury during recovery, as well as more sluggish nerve firing and injury to another limb. An example is that in dogs who sustain a CCL (cranial cruciate ligament) tear to one limb there is an 80% chance of tearing the other rear leg, even after the first injury has been repaired surgically.
One such application of preventive care is the early developmental x-rays I recommend to diagnose dysplasia in dogs and cats who are between 4-12 months of age. If developmental problems are detected, changes in diet and nutrition and in-office and home physical therapy help pets maximize their growth potential and correct abnormal carriage and rotation of limbs which can have positive benefits, as long as those exercises begin during development.
In all cases in which dogs or cats appear to have an odd way of walking, seem “off”, have trouble on steps, clumsiness when jumping or getting on or off furniture or any symptom that makes an owner question whether a pet is moving correctly, my staff and I encourage breeders and pet owners to seek an expert veterinary opinion from a veterinarian who has advanced training in hands-on rehabilitative treatments and is a member of the American Association of Rehabilitative Veterinarians (AARV).
In many cases, surgical intervention cannot correct an early injury which has healed incorrectly with compensations to the muscles and opposite limb and spine. Early intervention with physical therapy can make a huge difference for the comfort and development, and even improve life expectancy for pets.
In the case of tendon and ligament tears, muscle strain, ACL or CCL injuries, I have seen many pets heal through nonsurgical methods which include use of animal chiropractic, laser, ozone therapy and PRP (platelet rich plasma). These treatments have helped patients heal and have prevented injury in the opposite limb with excellent case outcomes.
If your pet has sustained an orthopedic injury, don’t wait to see if it gets better on its own. Get them to a veterinarian who works with rehab and prehabilitative therapies and on the road to recovery.
Dr. Cynthia Maro is a veterinarian at the Ellwood Animal Hospital in Ellwood City and the Chippewa Animal Hospital in Chippewa Township. She writes a biweekly column on pet care and health issues.
This article originally appeared on Beaver County Times: Maro: Prehabilitative therapy helps pets stay strong
