Your dog has been diagnosed with IVDD. Maybe your pup underwent surgery or maybe you have chosen to conservatively manage this condition. Your vet or someone you know has recommended hydrotherapy, underwater treadmill to help your pet.
You have called around to a few places that have hydrotherapy and they want your to come in 2-3 times a week for 30mins. Maybe the commute to this clinic is up to 1 hour (or more)! Or maybe you don’t have one close by.
PLUS they don’t allow you to come back to observe the treatment (I mean who wouldn’t want to see that cuteness overload?!)
I’m sure you have many questions and concerns about this type of treatment: Why is it so expensive for such a short treatment? Why do I have to take my dog so often? It’s so far! Is this really going to help my dog? What am I going to be able to do at HOME to help my dog?
Does my dog REALLY need to do this treatment?
Is this the ONLY other treatment option for my pet?
When should I start this hydrotherapy, underwater treadmill?
You are reading this blog, so I know you treat your pet like a member of your family. And you want the absolute BEST for your pet. So this “fancy” piece of equipment MUST be the best option…Right?
I’ll help to clear a few of these questions up, but first I’ll explain what the underwater treadmill is.
Hydrotherapy, Underwater treadmill involves your pup walking on a treadmill that is inside a topless box. This box is then closed with your dog inside and sealed (again, the top is open). This way, water can be added to the tank at varying levels depending on the goal of the treatment. If your dog has a hard time walking, more water will be added to the tank to help place less pressure on your dog’s joints (the water helps to make your dog move easier in the water by making him lighter). If the goal is to strengthen your dog, less water will be added to create more difficulty for your dog to walk through the water (think walking through shin or knee height water). This is different than swimming and is much more controlled.
Hydrotherapy does provide some benefit including the ability to help your dog walk with less pressure on his legs/joints which aides in exercise for many different conditions.
Underwater treadmill is good for pups with hind leg weakness from IVDD (intervertebral disc disease – back/neck problem in dogs), however if your dog is paralyzed, it is best for your dog to have SOME function of his back legs before starting this. If your pup has no function of his back legs, there is no reason sign him up for hydrotherapy.
Think of it like this. When babies are learning to move around, they first learn to sit, crawl, then to stand up, then to walk while holding on to something, and THEN they start walking by themselves. If you start your pup immediately in the underwater treadmill, before they have any leg function, it is likely to maybe encourage spinal walking (reflexive walking). Which IS good because that means your pup can walk to some degree, however he is unlikely to go beyond and get better and to more “normal” walking. You have skipped all of the necessary developmental steps that he needs to take (sitting up, going from sitting to standing, and standing still on his own) to RELEARN how to walk. Following so far?
Hydrotherapy is a great tool once your dog is able to go between all of those transitions to improve his ability to walk. This “fancy” tool is absolutely not necessary to get your dog walking again. So, if you don’t have access to one or it’s just too far to travel, don’t fret. There are plenty of things that you can do at home to get your pup walking again (stay tuned for another blog post on this).
We don’t use hydrotherapy in most cases because we feel you and your dog’s time is better spent on land based exercises that you can perform at home (so eventually you don’t need to continue to have rehab). And, more importantly, we need to address the root cause of your pup’s problem FIRST before we can think about walking and/or building strength. In the case of IVDD, the problem is poor communication between the spinal cord and muscles.
After the root problem is addressed, we need to go through the developmental sequence to relearn how to sit, go from sit to stand, and stand independently.
Unfortunately, hydrotherapy doesn’t address the communication between the muscles and spinal cord, and it doesn’t take your pet through the necessary developmental sequence he needs to get better.
The other major problem with this device is that your pup will likely receive this treatment provided by a technician who may or may not be trained in canine rehabilitation. This means that your dog can be missing out on specialized and individualized treatment. Technicians often are not trained how to progress your pup or the techniques necessary to decrease pain or improve muscle/spinal cord communication. So, unfortunately, many dogs that come to me AFTER wasting valuable time (and money) because they were not appropriately progressed during the treatment. This ends up being very costly in terms of time and money. Not to mention that you want your dog better…FAST.
We also want pet parents to participate in the treatment. Our aim as rehab professionals is to give you all the tools and knowledge so that eventually you don’t need us! We teach pet parents exactly how to help your pet and the best way to do it so that we get your pet moving and back to normal as soon as possible.
The truth is, most dogs can recover faster WITHOUT the use of an underwater treadmill in their rehabilitation program. If you were trying to lose weight and you decided to eat healthy only 1-2 days out of the week, you are unlikely to lose weight! Dogs with IVDD benefit from frequent and short bouts of targeted exercises (that we teach you how to provide) that improve their mobility and get them moving easier.
As we pointed out, underwater treadmill does not address the root cause of the problem, which is the communication from the spinal cord to the muscles. Without improving this communication and connection FIRST, the underwater treadmill will do little to help your pup.
Some dogs do benefit from the hydrotherapy, underwater treadmill, however in my experience, it is not the best way to help dogs help dogs with IVDD.
I hope this blog post helped to answer some of your questions about hydrotherapy, underwater treadmill and help you better decide if it’s the right treatment for your pet.