Ziggy, an 8 year old spaniel cross, had the usual spaniel zest for life. She loved nothing more than running free across the fields, burrowing into undergrowth and long grass, tail wagging nineteen to the dozen. But over the last few months, her owner noticed that she wasn’t running as freely as usual, seemed to lose interest quite quickly and was tiring more easily. He put it down to her age.
Being a sensible owner, he took Ziggy to his vet to get her checked out. They gave her a thorough examination but couldn’t find anything. The consensus was that it was probably a touch of arthritis, so they advised the owner to give her pain medication and stop walking Ziggy for a few weeks to see if that helped.
Have you had back pain, or pain in a large joint? If so, you may have noticed that other parts of your body start to hurt more as well and it’s not so easy to do the normal things you do every day.
Hunching over your keyboard for long periods of time can affect the muscles around your chest and shoulders and cause back and neck pain. And when one part of your body hurts, other parts seem to come out in sympathy. Sometimes this compensatory pain can be even worse than the original pain.
Because muscles are a body system, problems in one area will cause imbalance in how you move, causing more problems. So you might start to limp, or hold one shoulder lower than the other. If it goes on for a long time, or starts slowly so you don’t really notice, you may not really notice the problem until it get really bad.
That’s what happened to me last summer when I “suddenly” found I couldn’t walk or stand for any length of time without significant pain and I found out I had an arthritic hip.
Looking back at the videos we’ve recorded over the past three years showed that I was limping in all of them – but I wasn’t aware of it. I’d had odd pains for the previous year but I’d put them down to a muscular strain. Wrong.
It’s the same in dogs. Muscle pain is often related to joint arthritis, but the main pain may be felt elsewhere, because of the dog compensating for the joint problem. Pain from compensatory issues tends to become progressively worse and never settles without treatment.
Chronic pain in dogs can cause behavioural problems, changes in posture, changes in appearance and loss of mobility. If your dog has two or more of these then it’s fairly likely he has a muscle problem. And most muscle problems in dogs will also cause a neck issue.
Your neck affects every movement you make. Neck problems are often caused by disease of the lumbar spine and hip. They can cause a reduced quality of life, anxiety and even breathing problems. What can you do if you think your dog may have a problem?
First thing is to get your dog thoroughly checked by your vet.
But there are also some things you can try at home:
– a pillow can help their pain and allows them to sleep better
– encouraging your dog to search for treats regularly can help, because bending down to sniff lengthens the neck and the different movements the dog makes while searching can keep the neck and body more mobile and free up any tightness
– and avoid slippery floors in your house – cover them with non-slip mats and rugs or carpet
Ziggy turned out to have hip arthritis (I empathise) but with a good physio programme the owner could work with and suitable pain medication she’s still enjoying life with some short runs in the field.
Keep training!
Carol