Front Matter

180 Canine Sports Medicine and Rehabilitation

(3) Duration of work (time or distance
traveled).
(4) Environment (terrain, footing, substrate).
(5) Impact (no impact, low impact, high impact).

The effectiveness of a workout should not be
measured by patient fatigue. It should focus on
the quality of the movements. The exercise‐to‐
fatigue approach may lead to overtraining, exer­
cise‐related pain, and even overuse injuries.

Getting started

The rehabilitation therapist should coach the
client and the patient simultaneously when ini­
tiating any new exercise that will be applied to
the home exercise program (HEP). It is most
effective to train the patient how to do an exer­
cise before training the client how to perform
the exercise with the patient. The client is then
asked to attempt the exercise with the patient
(Sharp, 2010). The exercise may be modified
during the training session to best fit the abili­
ties of the patient and/or the client, whose
available time and likely compliance are con­
sidered when creating the HEP.
The patient’s willingness to work with both the
rehabilitation therapist and the client should be
assessed. Dogs are smart enough to find many
ways to avoid doing difficult exercises correctly.
The rehabilitation therapist should be aware of
the common avenues for evading work so that
they can be prepared for the behavior and correct
or prevent it.
For example, a common exercise used to
strengthen the gluteal, adductor, and hamstring
muscles involves training the dog to do a sit‐to‐
stand movement on a hill, facing perpendicular
to the slope. This activity isolates and strength­
ens the muscles in the downhill leg. The patient
will frequently evade by positioning itself more
parallel to the slope with the thoracic limbs
downhill. This allows the patient to use gravity
to assist the thoracic limbs to pull itself into a
standing position rather than using the pelvic
limbs to push off into a standing position. To
prevent this, the rehabilitation therapist should
stand uphill of the dog in a  position that dis­
courages this behavior, by giving a “heel” com­
mand or by keeping a hand on the patient’s
collar or harness.

Rules

There are several rules that can aid in achieving

success with therapeutic exercise programs:

(1) Always start within the animal’s comfort

zone, gradually increasing each of the

variables until the goals are met. If the goal

is to complete 10 repetitions (reps) of an

activity with good form, the therapist

might start with three to four reps. As the

patient approaches the ability to complete

10 good reps, the exercise is made more

difficult. This might involve changing to a

more challenging movement or doing the

same movement in a more challenging

environment (Drum et al., 2015).

(2) Strength work is generally done three to

five times per week, alternating training

days with days off. It is important to main­

tain the dog’s motivation to carry out the

exercises, and overtraining can quickly

lead to a loss of motivation.

(3) Some clients will insist on working their

dogs every day despite clear instructions.

For this group, exercises focus upon the

thoracic limb one day, the core the next

day, the pelvic limb the next day, and so on

to prevent overtraining and allow muscles

time to repair.

(4) Daily stretching routines are advised (see

Chapter 6).

Tools of the trade

This section describes commonly used equip­

ment in a canine rehabilitation practice. The

temptation is to find the least expensive option

for each of these pieces of equipment. Instead,

the emphasis should be on establishing safety

for the patient as well as the client. Each piece

of equipment will be described below, with

clinical applications explained later in the

chapter.

Physioballs

Also known as Swiss balls or exercise balls,

physioballs come in a variety of shapes and

sizes. A peanut ball is shaped like a peanut, and