Muddy Paws and Hairballs

How to Exercise Your Dog Safely (and Prevent Costly Injuries)

Amy Castro, MA, CSP Season 3 Episode 103

🐾 Is Your Dog Getting the Right Amount of Exercise? Or Are They at Risk for Injury? 🦴

Whether your dog is a non-stop zoomer, a weekend warrior, or a laid-back couch cuddler, keeping them fit, active, and injury-free is key to their long-term health. But how do you know when to push them—and when to let them rest? 🤔

In this episode of Muddy Paws and Hairballs, Dr. Kelly Fishman, a veterinary sports medicine expert, shares her best advice on customizing exercise for your dog’s age, breed, and activity level—plus key injury prevention strategies every pet parent should know!

🦴 In This Episode:

How much exercise does your dog really need? (And when to push or slow down)
Signs your dog is overdoing it—what pet parents often miss
Breed-specific considerations for keeping dogs fit and injury-free
The role of joint health supplements and proper nutrition in mobility
Warm-ups & cool-downs: Why they matter for active dogs
Fun, safe activities for senior dogs to keep them engaged
Why regular vet checkups are key for long-term dog health

🐕 Dr. Fishman’s expert tips will help you keep your dog active, pain-free, and happy for years to come! 🐾  Listen now!

Learn more about Dr. Fishman at: https://www.strutanimal.com/

For more info about the muscle supplement Dr. Fishman recommends, go to Myos Pet: https://myospet.com/

#ActiveDogs #DogHealth #SeniorDogs #DogExercise #PreventInjuries #HealthyPets #MuddyPawsPodcast

Comment on this episode! For questions or if you need a reply- please email us at Amy@StarlightPetTalk.com

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Thanks for listening to Muddy Paws and Hairballs, your go-to resource for all things pet care. From dog training, behavior, and socialization to cat enrichment, pet adoption, and tackling behavior problems, we provide expert advice and real talk to help you create a happy, healthy life with your pets. Whether you're dealing with dog anxiety, looking for puppy training tips, or exploring enrichment ideas for your cat, we've got you covered. Be sure to check out all our episodes!

Amy Castro:

Is your dog? That dog, you know, the one who thinks walk means drag the human at full speed and turns every squirrel sighting into a high-stakes chase, and who believes the living room rug is the perfect place to practice their zoomy takeoffs. Or maybe your dog's your running buddy, the one who never turns down a jog but ends up limping and giving you the side eye, like I told you, that was a bad idea. In this episode, we're talking about all dogs, whether your dog's more of a couch potato or an active dog who loves neighborhood jogs, backyard sprints or intense adventure hikes. How can we keep our pups healthy and injury-free? What are the signs that they've overdone it and how do we make sure they keep living their best zoomy lives for years to come? Let's find out together. Stay tuned. Hey there everybody.

Amy Castro:

I'm Amy Castro, and welcome to Muddy Paws and Hairballs, where we dig into the messy, hilarious and realistic life with pets. Today we're talking about keeping dogs active and preventing injuries for all dogs, from the casual strollers to the full-throttle zoomers and everybody in between, and we want to keep them healthy, strong and injury-free for a lifetime of adventures and to help us figure out how to help our high-energy dogs, especially move without wrecking their joints. We've got Dr Kelly Fishman joining us today. Dr Kelly is the founder of Strut Animal Mobility Specialist and she's a veterinary sports medicine expert who helps dogs and cats stay mobile, recover from injuries and thrive at every stage of their lives. She's a certified veterinary acupuncturist and canine rehabilitation therapist and she is passionate about giving pet parents practical tools, which we love around here, to help their animals live longer, healthier and more active lives. So welcome to the show, dr Kelly. We are so excited to have you here.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

Thank you, I'm happy to be here, amy.

Amy Castro:

Let's go ahead and start with some of the basics. So how do we know, you know, based on who our dog is, what is the appropriate level of activity?

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

Yeah, so it definitely is kind of the two things I'd think about.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

One it would be age. So, first of all, we all would know that a puppy needs different activity restrictions than an adult dog, than a senior, and what that means is, if I have a lab and it's four months old, I want to be really conscious of those growing bones and those fragile joints, that I don't do things that, like you know, jumps that are too high for my animal, or lots of activities like running really hard on concrete, which are really, you know, hard on young growing bones. So you know, if I have a younger dog, you know there's certain guidelines that us rehab vets are taught about what are safe activities for puppies and then usually adult dogs if they don't have any underlying medical issue, and sometimes those medical issues that I think of because I'm a veterinarian that's dealing with the body I don't really think of, like a kidney disease, right, I think of a Frenchie that is really predisposed to getting a disc herniation, and that's the stuff that I worry about. You know, how can I prevent a disc herniation and a French bulldog?

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

So things that I would tell someone who had a dog like that would be like you know, again, just like we don't want our puppies jumping, we probably don't want those dogs jumping also.

Amy Castro:

You know.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

So that's something that's, you know, a bit obvious there. So but if you, you know, if you keep aside just the breed and the age, then we go into our seniors and our senior dogs are more likely to have arthritis, neurologic conditions that are causing them to slow down and be a bit more fragile. And so those dogs you also want to be a little bit conscious of and not overwork them in ways that kind of flare those issues up. So, thinking about the breed of your dog, thinking about their age and then thinking about what you can do to just prevent injury and then also to do safe and fun activities as well.

Amy Castro:

Right, I'm glad you mentioned the puppy thing because although you know, as somebody that does rescue and has puppies come through our program and have raised puppies, I'm aware of that. But I think I'm often surprised that there is a certain mindset, or maybe a lack of knowledge or information that says, oh, they're young, they can do whatever because they're young and, you know, not necessarily thinking about growth plates, things like that. That is really important. We were even seeing that right now my daughter's got a little terrier mix and when she overdoes it you can tell it's like a hint of a limp, but it's because she's still young. So you do need to keep an eye on that.

Amy Castro:

When it comes to the breeds, we don't do a lot of DNA testing but I had mentioned to you before we started recording that my dog is two-thirds English Bulldog, one-third American Bulldog and so you know she has a lot of those, especially the English Bulldog characteristics and she's already had an ACL reconstruction and I'm constantly telling her stop running because I don't want that knee and she's got loose hips and things like that. That sort of come with the breed but I think, also poor breeding, because she was intentionally bred to be what she is. It wasn't like an oopsie thing. Unfortunately, so is DNA testing. Like if somebody has a dog and they don't know what it is, does it matter the breed Like should they find out, because then they can watch out for certain potential sources of injury.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

Yeah, I mean I suggest that, and part of it is we know, we are now learning that some of those common orthopedic conditions are genetic. So, thinking about our French Bulldogs, we know that those compressed discs, that interverticular disease or IVDD that they suffer from, that dash hounds suffer from, that pugs have, that sometimes bulldogs have as well. Send it off to some of these DNA testing systems and not only finding so much what breeder dog is, but what kind of conditions they are genetically predisposed to. And another interesting thing that just came to light in the veterinary area that most vets and maybe most people don't know are that those ACL tears or that cruciate ligament tear, that's actually genetic.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

So Labradors for example, are genetically predisposed to get those cranial cruciate or ACL or CCL tears that we all dread, and your dog has.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

It's a very expensive process to fix it too. Oh gosh, it's so expensive. And it's not even that it's so expensive just to have the surgery. But if your dog was a person, they'd be going to rehabilitation for months after to strengthen right away. And then you know, I'm a rehab vet and I sometimes tell people I said you know the surgery is expensive but rehab is going to be twice as much and not everybody has access to rehab. And that's something that you know. Why I'm here to talk to people? Because I want pet parents to know that even if you're, you know, unable to pursue formal rehab programs for injuries, there is stuff you could do.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

But sorry, a tangent there. But yes, of course, our genetic things that these breeds have and and right now we don't really have a test for, you know, a cruciate ligament injury predisposition, like you would with a French bulldog, and those compressed back issues. But I'm sure very soon we will. You know I'm planning to adopt a lab, a little black lab puppy, in two years and I'm sure then I hope that that's an opportunity for me to know and you know knowledge is power I'll still take my little black lab puppy because that's my breed, that I love and that's the dog that I want. But you know I'll have to understand that I'm going to have to do certain things to try to prevent the injury that they are just predisposed to.

Amy Castro:

Yeah, Like you said, the knowledge is definitely the power. I know we had a little dog one time and it was just a mix of a whole bunch of things and that was pre-DNA testing. But I remember specifically the vet talking about the fact that, because the dog had such a long back, you know watch the jumping, the jump, because of course he was always bing, bing, bing, bing, bing and it's like stop doing that.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

I feel like I'm always telling people stop doing that stop doing that, I know, but it's also redirecting to save things. So it's like I did a consultation yesterday on a nearly two-year-old golden doodle and was roughhousing with other dogs and another dog jumped on it and then since then has just not been right in the back end and we took all the x-rays, we are trying to figure out what's wrong. And I said well, one of the things you could do is that when in the house, what they were doing is they were throwing their food for their dog, so it was slipping and sliding in the home on their wood floors and splaying out the back legs and going around these hard little turns because it was a fun way to interact with their dog, and I was like gosh, you know, that's just asking for trouble. And your dog turns out has an iliopsoas injury and doing those kinds of activities is something that could really flare it up. So let's do other things instead. Like let's go on long hikes, like that's a nice safe activities, keeping things in straight lines, you know, keeping your dog on a tight leash on soft surfaces, so avoiding those concrete and staying on grass and dirt, you know. So it's not about necessarily not doing anything, it's just knowing what's safe and what's not.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

And then one thing about jumping that I like to bring up, just because something is something that most people are not aware of. And again, general practice vets don't have this little like cheat that I can, I can just tell everybody. But what it is, it is what's what is too high to jump, and what someone has to do is they just can take a tape measure and they can measure, as our dog is standing, from the paw, as they're standing on the floor, to the elbow, which, if you don't know what the elbow is, because sometimes people think elbow is the knee, so just Google it. Where's the dog's elbow right? Take a picture, we can put a picture up on the video.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

It's kind of where our elbow is, but sometimes they think it's in the back of the body. But regardless, take a tape measure and measure from the height of the floor to your dog's elbow. Anything above that, you're kind of in an injury risk zone. So then if you go to your couch and you're like gosh, my dog's elbow is 10 inches but my couch is, you know, 16 inches, I probably should try to give them a little bit of a step to go down to. That's a little bit safer than jumping on and off that.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

And because we know with injuries a lot of times that our dogs that are not athletes right, are these micro injuries, meaning that every day they're jumping out of this giant SUV onto concrete to get to the dog park over and over and over, and then the tendons of your shoulder and your spine is absorbing all those micro injuries. And then by the time your dog's 10, all of a sudden they're, you know, blowing the rotator cuff or have spinal injury. And you're like gosh, like my dog was never a dog athlete. How did that happen?

Amy Castro:

Yeah, well, and that kind of ties in well to my next question about you know some of the what are some of the common mistakes that we make in you know, exercising our dogs and getting out there. So I mean, you've already told us a couple of things thinking about the surface that they're on and that more natural. I remember when I had my ACL done, it was like closed chain versus open chain. It's more natural movements that the doctor wanted me doing. And so when you think about a dog, like you said, hiking and their legs are going in the right direction that they normally would go in, and the way the knees are supposed to bend, not flipping hips out 80 degrees further than they're supposed to be and sliding and things like that, that's such great advice.

Amy Castro:

As far as the jumping issue, because I had never, you know, I've always thought about my little chihuahua and I don't like it when she jumps off the chair because she's got these little spindly legs. But no, you never even really thought that there was a good way to know how high is too high. So thank you for sharing that. What other mistakes do you see people making that kind of? End them up coming to you and needing either surgery or rehab, or both.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

So one of the biggest ones is the dog chuck it and or Frisbee. So I was at a dog event and they had someone who was doing a dog's you know, sport or spectacle really or I don't want to be called a spectacle because it was just a demonstration and what they had done. They had a great relationship with their dog where they were throwing the Frisbee and it was jumping off their back and catching the Frisbee, midair and then also midair was turning around and then landing hard. So movements like that, where they're jumping and twisting and turning to get a ball or a Frisbee, those are things that can really put them at risk.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

And some of the times that I've had people come to me where all of a sudden their dog was playing, chuck at ball, jumped up, landed hard and then had a, suddenly had a spinal cord injury and couldn't walk and had to be rushed to the vet hospital and have an emergency spinal surgery. You know those types of injuries are, you know, caused by that that that type of impact to the spine and ball plays fun, like dogs, like balls, like that's what, and they love to have that. So what could we do safer? Well, why don't we just try to prevent some of the twisting and the jumping. So let's keep things in a straight line. Let's do it on a grass you know field, with nice, you know footing that they could dig their paws into. We're not in anywhere where there's lots of big potholes or sticks or other dogs to jump on them.

Amy Castro:

So that's how I would say to do it safely. Yeah, that's a good one, and you had mentioned, you know, getting in and out of the vehicle for the dog parks, but that's another thing. I mean, I'm not a dog park person for a lot of reasons, but some of the.

Amy Castro:

you know, when you get dogs even just my sometimes I feel like I live in a dog park running an animal rescue. But we've got, you know, four dogs that get outside and it's a nice day. And you've got, like I said, down from my tiny little spindly-legged chihuahua, who's pretty much smart enough to stay away from everybody, but then all the other knuckleheads, including my knucklehead who's already had her ACL repaired they're running, they're spinning, they're zooming around the pool, they're making these tight turns. So sometimes just monitoring how that play is happening and maybe taking a little more control over that, instead of just sitting in my chair and watching it happen, because it's kind of funny to see a bulldog zipping around in circles with the terrier but not good for the knee, I'm quite sure.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

Yeah, and then there's also one other thing, and I don't want to get too deep into it because people can certainly Google it or you know, look on my Instagram for examples but doing a warm up and a cool down before a vigorous activity. And you know people who have agility dogs, hunting dogs, dog working dogs, dog athletes they all know this and this isn't something that maybe the general pet owner would know. But there are things you should do for 90 seconds that you could do of a warmup for a dog, and then a cool down is really important, and what a cool down would mean would be I'm going to slowly walk my dog after they've done this vigorous activity, before I put them in my truck hot to go home. So I'm going to do a one minute walk. I'm going to also, during that time, start to look for a little bit of lameness.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

I'm going to see are they a bit gimpy in their back legs? Is their tail lower and it's never low, but now it is Is their head kind of hanging down? Watch for subtle signs of lameness and just changes in body posture as they're walking. After you've done some of that activity, and then also it's a great time to just do a little bit of like what I call dog yoga, which is when you can put them up on the curb and do a little bit of a spine stretch and as you're doing that, check their paws. Look at their paws, check for injuries that they could have sustained. So that's a great time during that cool down phase, to not only cool them down, to hopefully prevent injury, which is really that's why you want to do it is to prevent injury. Also, the spot injury is when that would be a great time to do that.

Amy Castro:

Yeah, and that's. You know that's a great time to kind of give them the once over, and especially for us that are, you know, in hotter climates. You know you're always looking for, in addition to cuts and things like that on the pad, but you know, being very cautious about hot pavement and hopefully preventing but also looking for those types of injuries as well. You know you mentioned a couple of the signs of overdoing it. Let's say we don't necessarily notice anything today but, like Gigi I mentioned, like I'll see, you're walking down the hallway and it's just not a normal gait. There's a little bit of a we say a little bit of hitching or giddy up, and when we see things like that a limp or the changes that you mentioned, it's Should that be like an immediate run to the vet?

Amy Castro:

Is it one of those things that you watch it and kind of see how it goes? Should you give them something Like if I had a hitch in my giddy up, we pop a pill and we go on about our business, right, we don't necessarily run to the doctor because my knee's a little sore from working out yesterday, kind of thing. What should we do when we see these things?

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

So most injuries are muscular, skeletal, no-transcript. Those injuries get more chronic, meaning as they've. You've given it a week or two, the dog's getting better because that's a soft tissue injury that's healing. But then by the time you take it to the vet, your dog's at the vet, it's adrenaline's going, it's feeling good. The vet comes over for five minutes, especially a general practitioner. They don't have tons of time.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

Like I do as a rehab vet. I'm there for 45 minutes feeling every single bone and joint in your dog's body and muscle. They don't have a lot of time, those GP vets. So detecting that injury two weeks later the dog's feeling good at the vet hospital in five minutes is going to be really, really tough. So I don't think necessarily going to the emergency room is where I would go for sudden issues with limping and lameness. But I would get in with your regular veterinarian pretty soon when they could still be able to detect the injury and feel it. So I'm all about getting there early and then just knowing that lameness and limping is not normal and is a sign of pain.

Amy Castro:

So that's.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

I think, something that people sometimes they're like well, he's really great, but he, you know, he runs after his ball Like he's the happiest dog. He goes on his his walk but as we go home he's not hitching the gate every step. You know, unfortunately that's a, that's a problem and and, uh, you know, maybe it's it's something that we can, we can fix and we can definitely help those dogs.

Amy Castro:

Yeah, are there other things we could be doing to prevent some of the injuries that you see? Like I know we've gotten, we'll get bags and bags of donated items at the rescue and every once in a while there's like a doggy knee brace. I got one the other day in a bag. It was like the tiniest little knee brace. I'm thinking who can I put this on? Who needs a brace? You know, like is wrapping or bracing or doing any of that stuff or feeding them something different? What can we do to help prevent some of these injuries from happening?

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

Yeah. So in regard to wrapping and bracing, I wouldn't suggest that, and the reason is that, because dogs come in so many shapes and sizes, getting a brace that's actually fit for your dog's body, you have to have them custom made to be effective. And custom made means that they've taken a mold, a cast of your dog's knee and they've recreated specifically for your their knee a brace. So if it's not something like that, it's not going to do much to stabilize.

Amy Castro:

So it's not worth it.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

But what I would say you should do is you should supplement, and you should do supplements that are smart and things that actually help to, you know, stop with some of the breakdown in the body. So I have top two for that one. Okay, so one is actually collagen. So they did a study of dogs that would run I don't know what the distance was at the top of my head, but it was, you know, I think was a mile intensely at the end and they had these dogs they're young and healthy and they were running and they actually sampled their blood after and they found that they basically produced at the end of the run all these biomarkers of things that break down the collagen in their knee. So a normal, healthy dog, just with that kind of sudden physical activity, will start to break down their joints. And one of the things that they did in the study is that then they gave half those dogs collagen and the dogs that were supplemented with collagen actually had less of those biomarkers of inflammation of the cartilage in their blood. So that would be something that I would say like.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

I suggest not necessarily joint preventatives like glucosamine and chondroitin, because I think the evidence for those types of supplements are less so, but there is evidence for things like collagen being protective to the joints, so that's something that I would put my young, healthy dog on.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

And then the other thing is a supplement from fertilized egg yolks and it's called fortitropin, and what this fertilized egg yolk supplement does is it helps to stop the breakdown of muscle associated with injury. So when your dog was injured and they hurt he hurt his ACL his body started to produce something that would break down the muscle. And you've had issues with your own body, and I've had issues with my own body as well. I know when I have an injury, you're weaker, and you're weaker because your body is trying to heal itself, but in trying to heal itself it starts to break down that muscle. So this ingredient for the trope in which my top dog supplement is called Myo's Pet, so it's M-Y-O-S-P-E-T that supplement which again, that's a fertilized yogurt, prevents that breakdown of muscle, which is great, because you don't ever think of the muscle. It's all about joint supplements.

Amy Castro:

Yeah, so, and all about the joints.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

I go to the pet food aisle and there's a million joint supplements and not one thing dedicated to muscle, and we know that if it's not going to be a joint injury, it's going to be a muscle injury. Yeah, so that's what I do with my young, healthy, active dogs. I get them on Myo's Pet. I get them on a good quality collagen that has three types of collagen, if you could find it, because then that's also good for the skin. So that's what I would suggest. Doing things like that, I think, if it is prevention, I mean studies in that MyosPet have mostly been with injured dogs and senior dogs and there's lots of science behind it. But you know, I give it to my young, healthy dogs as well, just as a preventative.

Amy Castro:

Yeah, and you're talking like across the board, like if I've got a young dog, let's just start doing that, obviously, unless there's some contraindication that we've talked to our vet about.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

Yeah, exactly, and I, you know, and I think, cause it's like why not? And it's one of those things where I had that dog with an iliopsoas strain and they're like gosh, like how do I prevent this from happening again? I was like, well, your dog has a muscle problem, so you need to be on a muscle supplement that makes sure that they're strong, you know and then you have to do exercises, which is a whole, nother part of it that we can kind of dive into.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

if you want to dive into dog exercise, which is, like my favorite, most fun thing on the planet to do with your dogs and to teach people and to bond with them, but yeah, so I do it as a preventative. You would definitely do it if your dog was a senior and had an injury. That's a no brainer because of science is behind it.

Amy Castro:

But I like it as a preventative as well, yeah.

Amy Castro:

Yeah, let's talk about the older guys and or the guys you know that have had an injury. I mean, I think there are some people who would say, okay, my dog is now getting older, so I'm not going to worry about exercise anymore or activity anymore, as long as they can go out and go to the bathroom by themselves. Is you know, is it good to continue the activity? And you know, is it basically the same signs that I'm looking for, that I've overdone it? Or how do we keep those guys moving so that they have good quality of life up to the end?

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

Yeah. So this is actually the reason I got into veterinary rehab was because I learned that the number one reason, aside from having cancer, for euthanasia in older dogs was basically being frail. Everything inside them is healthy and they feel good and they could look at you and be like mom, I'm all going to go play, but my body is breaking down. And when I found out that there's an area of vet med called physical rehabilitation, which is like the dog body shop and I could fix that and increase their mobility and have them moving and have them healthy, I had to be part of it. So there are so many things that you could do for those older dogs and one of the things that you should do is to never stop moving. Take them on walks and if they're slowing down in their walks, try to do shorter walks a couple times a day.

Amy Castro:

I've heard people like I get this far down the road and then I'm picking the dog up and having to carry him home. It's like, well, maybe you shouldn't have gone so far down the road. Like maybe go around the block or go up and down your own street instead of going so far.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

Amy, that is the advice that I give people all the time. If that's, you know, if your dog is only getting like four houses down the block, do one house or two houses down the block and then come back and then next, you know, do that for two weeks and then challenge them a little bit and go two and a half houses like, and then just kind of slowly try to increase their endurance. But you know, when dogs have those problems, especially your senior dogs, that's not a problem with the cardiovascular system, like a lot of people think. It is like their heart and lungs are failing. That's a.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

That's a problem of strength and it's a problem of not having muscle strength, because as a senior dog you know there's certain biological things that happen to senior dogs that make it hard for them to build and maintain muscle. And so if you don't have muscle to power yourself on that walk, you just don't go as far. That's why we say keep them moving, because then if you keep moving you keep building that muscle. You just don't go as far. That's why we say keep moving, because then if you keep moving you keep building that muscle.

Amy Castro:

Well, and it's the same for us. I mean everything that you just said, all this fantastic advice. If you take out the word dog and put people or put your own name in there, all of that is good advice. Do what you can. Keep moving, the inability to move and the lack of activity. I was watching a video the other day that was talking about a certain group of doctors was referring to recliners as your pre-coffin, because you get older and you settle into that recliner and you think you can't do it.

Amy Castro:

So, therefore, you don't do it and you know you lose your, then you lose your ability to do it, and so you know this is, you know, whether you're a younger person or you know, but I think, especially with older people that might have older pets, like this is going to be good for you to get in your butt out there and walk. You know, to start with two houses, then four houses, and and make it a challenge to have both of you live more active and healthier lifestyle.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

And exactly, and it's one of those things, too, where you know, if I'm a senior citizen, like I'm aware that I'm slowing down and I'm getting slower, so I'm going to do things like do water aerobics, like continue to exercise, try to eat in healthy ways that build muscle, and I could even go to you know the human, uh, the market and I can see all the different things and you know areas of supplements that they can do to build muscle and dogs, like I said, don't have that.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

So like knowing that there are things like that. When I was talking about that Mayo's pet supplement, that's actually the, the study that they did, which was groundbreaking, to show the benefits of their product. They studied it in senior dogs and they actually showed that the senior dogs were less frail, and so you know it's like they're losing muscle. Let's get them on a nice supplement to help maintain that muscle and keep them moving. Do exercises, Do you know? Do your stretches? Like there's a lot that you could do. The one thing I want people to know is that please don't think that there's something we can can offer your dog, because there's something that you have to do that you have to say goodbye for that reason. Like there is, there are things.

Amy Castro:

Yeah, and and investigate that.

Amy Castro:

I mean there's nothing sadder than seeing your pet whether it's your dog or I mean we've been talking about dogs, but cats too, you know to see them get to that point where they're slowing down and they're just, you know, not themselves, and you start really questioning their quality of life.

Amy Castro:

And if there's something we can do to prolong that I mean, obviously everybody's body's going to, you know, wear out and give out at some point. But if we can prolong that and give them the best quality of life by doing the things that you've talked about and by giving you know to, I mean that's to me that's brilliant, that you know addressing the joint issues and the muscle issues, because those two are the obviously pivotal in keeping us all moving. You know, if we could be doing those things and have that better quality of life, I mean it's something that we should all be doing for sure. Yeah, absolutely so. Any final thoughts or advice that you would want to share with people? I mean, obviously you've shared a ton of great advice so far, but something that we want to leave them with to ponder as they move forward from this episode.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

Well, first of all, cats. I am a cat lover so maybe I'll just do a little quick cat plug, because that's something that. So I am a huge cat person and I have a senior kitty and I noticed that my senior cat started to do this thing where she wouldn't jump straight up onto the bed so what she would do is she had a little side table so she would jump from the floor to the side table and then to the bed and she had stopped playing and she was sleeping a lot and it was like, well, you know, she's 18, she has kidney disease and maybe that's like she's getting kind of older. And then, you know, I didn't, you know dumb's 18, she has kidney disease and maybe that's like she's getting kind of older. And then, you know, I didn't, you know dumb veterinarian like doesn't even realize that their own animal is like suffering from severe arthritis. And I finally did a good exam on her and I was like goodness, like her she hurts, like this is why she's doing that.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

And just really understanding that pain in animals isn't always going to be obvious. It is going to be subtle changes in their regular behavior. So a lot of the times, by the time they're limping and they're lame. It's already kind of, the injury has been around for a long time and they're already been suffering. So starting to pay attention, if anyone could know to those little subtle changes in their normal behavior. Anyone could know, to those little subtle changes in their normal behavior, meaning like they were going on one mile walk, were, you know, really feeling good, tail was wagging the whole time, you know, running to get back home and then all of a sudden they don't want to go on their walk anymore. There's another way home. They keep stopping and wanting to sit or they keep smelling, you know. You know the flowers and checking where their dogs went to the bathroom and they're kind of like behind me on the leash. That's a sign of a problem. You know my cat not wanting to jump as high as she used to, that was a sign of a problem and so I didn't have to, you know, wait until she was actually limping to know and bring her in. Like that's those little subtle changes in behavior.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

We as veterinarians are now recognizing our signs of pain and decreased mobility and strength that we should be aware of. So recognizing that stuff and trusting your intuition, you know I have people come into my exam room and be like there's something wrong with my dog. I don't know what it is, but there's something off and he's not obviously limping, he's not yelping, he wants to still play ball, he still wants to go to the dog park, but at the end of the you know, every once in a while there's something just off with his gait. You know, and and, lo and behold, there is something and we've, we figure it out. And but just as long as people can know that that take, take that intuition that there's something a little bit off, like trust yourself.

Amy Castro:

Yeah, that's such a good point because I think sometimes we get really really busy and we don't necessarily notice those things until they get really bad. And, like you said, our animals are not. They obviously can't tell us and they're usually pretty stoic in kind of hiding things. But it's interesting you mentioned the cat not wanting to jump up, because I have an older cat named Pickles and then I've got the middle age cat. He's had multiple names. We we call him pinny pinhead because his head is just too small for his body in my opinion and he's always been like that.

Amy Castro:

But I have this video that was kind of funny because we have baby gates everywhere to keep dogs controlled here at the rescue and so he's sitting there, he's looking at the baby gate, he's looking at the top of it and Pickles, who's I don't know six or seven years older than he is, walks up, sits down next to him, looks at him and it just goes and just hops over it and he kind of gets a hold of it and then he kind of pulls himself and scrambles.

Amy Castro:

So it's like, yeah, there's definitely, and we did take him in and got it, got it all checked out and everything. But it was like it was funny at first, but then, when I started thinking about that video, it's like there's no reason why she, who is so much older than him, can, can just go from a sit up over that gate it's not that high and then he's, you know, having to think about it and then drag himself over it. And it wasn't an obvious thing. It wasn't like, you know, if I manipulated his leg it hurt or that he was, you know, limping. But he definitely has signs of arthritis that she does not have and it doesn't have to be a super old animal, but noticing that change in behavior, that's huge, huge.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

And then for your cat, just one last thing I would put them. My pet does have a feline formula that I put my kitty on, so and loves it, thinks it's like the most delicious, like when I put it on top of his wet food, like cats are crazy for it. But so I would also start that, because, you know, cats get arthritis, just like dogs do, and people are not aware because they're not going to be limping like a dog, they're going to be doing exactly what your, your kitty did and, um, starting them on pain meds and then, you know, doing other things to support their, you know, joints and their muscles is there are the same options for dogs.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

There are for kitties too.

Amy Castro:

Good to know we don't want to.

Amy Castro:

we talk a lot about cats on this show because uh yeah, I'm glad you brought them up at the end, because I felt sort of bad. It's like we're talking only about dogs and we usually talk about cats, because our rescue is probably 90% cats, you know, not to dog ratio, just for logistics, more than anything else. We didn't intend to be a cat rescue, but that's kind of the way it turned out. Well, wow, I know what I'm going to be buying as soon as I get off get off of this recording with you.

Amy Castro:

I mean, it's such a simple, such a simple thing and so easy to to take care of. Dr Kelly, I really appreciate you being here with us and sharing your experience and your expertise and, before I kind of close it out, is there anything else that you want to share, Any kind of any other story that you want to tell? Maybe, maybe a happy ending story of?

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

So I'll share the story of one of the first dogs that I worked on, which was a handsome black lab named Sanford, and he was a great dog. He was playing with his dad and was playing ball and was one of those dogs that jumped up and immediately fell in the wrong way and was completely paralyzed in all four legs because of a spinal cord rupture in his neck and his dad was a great pet parent and a brace down straight to a veterinary neurologist and had spinal surgery.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

And when I met him he came to the rehab department and the poor guy couldn't even stand. You know, he was just flopped out and they looked at me and they said can our dog walk again? And I said I think so, we're going to try. You know, he was just flopped out and they looked at me and they said can our dog walk again? And I said I think so.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

We're going to try. You know you fix the spine and now we have to build up strength and it's going to probably take a couple of months but we're going to do it and slowly, over time, just walking that dog to the first time it could stand again, and just the happiness that that family had and then the first time that they walked again was amazing. And then all of a sudden they are not only walking and jumping but able to play ball again and get back to their happy times to live the rest of their life. You know, that's something that as a rehab vet, like that joy is something that I get to have gotten to experience a couple of different times and in dogs and yeah, it's just, it's great.

Amy Castro:

Yeah, that's amazing. It's got to be so rewarding to see that, because it's a lot of hard work on your part and the animals part and the pet owners part, but the outcome is obviously well worth it.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

Absolutely and certainly. It's something that you know we, our dogs and cats, give us so much and you know, I was just struggling with my kitty before and they just give us so much love. And if we can just provide for them and give them the best quality of life and never have a bad day, then, gosh, we've done our job.

Amy Castro:

There you go. That's a great way to wrap up our episode. Well, dr Kelly, again, thank you so much for being with us today. I think it was super eye-opening for me. Like I said, I know I'm going to go shopping as soon as I get off of this recording and if listeners want to know more about you and your work or maybe they live in the area and they can come see you if their animal needs treatment what's the best way for people to get a hold of you?

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

The name of my little rehab practice is called Strut Animal and on my Instagram or Facebook or YouTube, strut Animal, you can find all the videos, mostly of dogs, because I don't all my cat patients. It's hard to get, it's hard to convince the kitties to do the exercises they're not cooperative.

Amy Castro:

Yeah, they're, you know, they have 10 minutes and it's not you know what I mean.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

It's it's not it's a rare cat to get them to be able to do lots of exercises, but they sure do love acupuncture and massage and other things like that and heating pad therapy. Oh yeah, I bet they do. But my Instagram, facebook and YouTube Strut Animal. If they're interested in learning more about that Myos Pet product, they can visit the website myospetcom. It's available for purchase on Amazon and directly from the website. So those would be the ways that they can find me, find that supplement if they're interested. And yeah, I'm in the Kennett Square Pennsylvania area, just outside of Philadelphia. So if anyone has any dog rehab needs, please call me.

Amy Castro:

I will, because I'm probably going to be moving to Northern Delaware.

Dr. Kelly Fishman:

Yeah, I actually. I have. About most of my patients are in Northern Delaware and, as well, Beautiful area.

Amy Castro:

I know, I know I'm looking forward to my house hunting, but yeah, that would be great.

Amy Castro:

Okay for everybody that's listening. Take these preventative steps that Dr Kelly has shared with us. Do the right thing when it comes to getting your dog activity, be safe and do everything that you can, like she said, so that everybody is living the best quality life together and your dog lives long and happy and your cat and active, and we'll see you again next week. Thanks for listening to Muddy Paws and Hairballs. Be sure to visit our website at muddypawsandhairballscom for more resources and be sure to follow this podcast on your favorite podcast app so you'll never miss a show. And hey, if you like this show, text someone right now and say I've got a podcast recommendation. You need to check the show out and tell them to listen and let you know what they think. Don't forget to tune in next week and every week for a brand new episode.

Amy Castro:

No-transcript no-transcript. Be sure to visit our website at muddypawsandhairballscom for more resources and be sure to follow this podcast on your favorite podcast app so you'll never miss a show. And hey, if you like this show, text someone right now and say I've got a podcast recommendation. You need to check this show out and tell them to listen and let you know what they think. Don't forget to tune in next week and every week for a brand new episode, and if you don't do anything else this week, give your pets a big hug from us.

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