admin – Page 6 – The Canine Fitness Centre

Conditioning the Canine Athlete

Properly conditioned dogs perform better, are less likely to suffer injuries, when injury does occur they are less severe, and recovery is faster. Fit dogs also suffer less stress which translates to greater stamina and longevity, creating a win–win situation for both dog and handler.

In human athletics and sports, athletes will spend a large proportion of their time training in the gym and exercising appropriately for their chosen sport. In human sports, the exercises and conditioning we do should be appropriate for the activity we plan to do, for example a marathon runner will do very different training from that of a 100m sprint athlete. Just like humans, the ways we exercise and agility dogs is very different to what we should do with a cani-cross dogs.

By undertaking an appropriate fitness and conditioning programme, you can better prepare the dog’s body to undertake the tasks we ask of it. If your dog has the right strength, balance and flexibility it will be able to adjust itself better, handle more difficult tasks easier both of which may lead to better performance but more importantly reduce the risk of injury should things not go according to plan.

Treating Iliopsoas Muscle Tears In Dogs

The iliopsoas muscle consists of the fusion of the iliacus and psoas major muscles. The psoas muscle attaches along the underside of the backbones, and the iliacus attaches on the inner side of the pelvis. These two muscles join together and form a common tendon that attaches onto the lesser trochanter of the thigh bone (femur). The function of this muscle is to externally rotate and flex the hip joint. Animals can function without this muscle.

Iliopsoas muscle tears are a relatively common yet infrequently diagnosed injury in dogs. Tearing of this muscle is very painful and causes pain and lameness.

Iliopsoas strains or tears result from excessive stretching of this muscle during highly athletic activities such as agility training or fetching a tennis ball. The injury occurs commonly at or near the muscle-tendon junction, the weak link.

Working Out With Your Dog, The Right Way

As we all look to burn off those extra Christmas pounds and start the year as we mean to go on, many of us feel the urge to get outside and increase our level of activity.

What better way of doing this than with our canine companions?

Exercising with your pet is a great way to bond and of course has health benefits, both physical and psychological, for both of you. It is estimated that more than 54% of pet dogs are overweight or obese so starting an exercise routine with your dog is an important step toward maintaining a healthy weight like it is for us.

This has the potential to increase both the length and the quality of your dog’s life.

Understanding Chiropractic Treatments

Does this sound familiar – your dog is in pain or has struggled with its loss of movement, you’ve tried surgery, physiotherapy and hydrotherapy but the discomfort doesn’t entirely go – maybe now is the time to try a dog chiropractor.

Dog chiropractic support is a holistic, all natural approach to treating a number of joint, muscular and skeletal problems that are common in some dogs and certain breeds. The principles and practices behind veterinary chiropractic are nearly identical to those used with humans.

Using ultra-violet light to protect your dog

We’re reducing the amount of chlorine we use in our pool by 75% thanks to new equipment that sanitises our pool water using ultra violet light and hydroxyl radicals.

We’ve been listening to our dog owners who occasionally worry about their dog being subjected to chlorine. While we’ve always kept our chlorine level low we felt compelled to act.

UV light messes with DNA. When shone on to bacteria or an algae spore it will attack the DNA within the cell and prevent the cell from reproducing. UV light will also inactivate chlorine resistant parasites such as Cryptosporidium and Giardia.

Slip-sliding through muddy dog walks

It’s autumn, when the leaves are at their most colourful, when our dogs track and chase new and exciting smells, and when the daily dog walk can turn into a mud fest or skating rink.

There are some very obvious seasonal hazards but they are only obvious if we are aware of them. This time of year could present a significant burden on my dogs’ muscles and joints and as such this is the season of high risk of muscular injury, strain and sprain.

This needs to be a time for us all to stop and think about how our dogs manage to manoeuvre on muddy walks or gain purchase on low friction surfaces such as icy ground, but more importantly how we as owners can help minimise their exposure to injury.

Treating Hip Dysplasia in Dogs

Hip Dysplasia is a common complaint in dogs, and usually occurs when the joint has not developed perfectly, so the ball and socket do not match up in joints.

It is often associated with large breeds of dogs and typically starts to become noticed when they are only a few months old. The ligaments and joint capsule that normally stabilise the hip joint become loose within the first few weeks of life and therefore the ball and socket hip joint that normally aligns with each other lacks alignment and harmonious fit. Any non-alignment will result in abnormal wear, and can lead to osteoarthritis.

This condition is primarily of genetic cause, although environmental factors such as obesity during puppyhood may influence whether an animal with the genes coding for hip dysplasia will develop a clinical problem. Current estimates show that there are more than one hundred genes code for hip dysplasia.

How long does healing take?

There isn’t a one size fits all approach to rehabilitation but one critical factor is how long tissue takes to heal. We’re talking here about muscle, bone, tendons, ligaments and cartilage, all of which heal differently.

A thorough understanding of tissue healing allows us to treat your dog appropriately; to know whether to stimulate or suppress inflammation, to ensure sufficient rest and minimise stress during repair, and what level of progressive stress to add during remodelling.

There are three phases of healing which are all slightly different for different tissue:

The inflammatory phase
The reparative phase
The remodelling or maturation phase

No more guessing at weight distribution

When your dog visits our resident Canine Physiotherapist for a clinical assessment you’ll benefit from accessing the only objective stance analyzer for dogs in Hampshire.

The Stance Analyzer offers our physiotherapists the objectivity needed to draw up the most appropriate game plan for our patients. The platform allows us to quickly evaluate the way your dog is standing and shifting weight to identify if there is a lameness issue and where to look for it.

The Stance Analyzer is an integral part of every patient that visits our clinic including wellness exams, limping evaluations, and treatment plan re-checks. Collecting a standing weight bearing assessment removes subjectivity and gives a simple report that makes it easy to discuss the status of the patient with your client.

Treating Elbow Dysplasia in Dogs

Elbow dysplasia is a catch-all term that describes the abnormal development of the elbow. The term includes a number of specific abnormalities, which affect different sites in the joint. If the three bones do not fit together absolutely perfectly the consequence is abnormal concentration of forces on a specific region of the elbow joint causing lameness.

Clinical examination may shows signs such as joint swelling and discomfort on movement of the elbow joint. Diagnosis of elbow dysplasia is important in deciding which treatment option. X-rays are a good starting point but many X-rays are normal. Sometimes a CT scan and/or arthroscopy (camera in the joint) are needed to confirm the problem.

All dogs whether they have surgery or not, should go through a comprehensive physiotherapy program including laser, hydrotherapy, exercise and dietary advice.

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