Could Your Dog Be Hurting—and You Don't Know It?

How do you know if your dog is in pain? What if some of the behavior you see from your dog is actually connected to pain? I got to sit down with Ali Sutch of Up to Snuff – who offers dynamic dog assessments to spot potential signs of pain – to talk about pain in dogs, how to recognize it, its connection to your dog's behavior, and what options you have if you suspect pain in your dog. Research suggests that up to 80% of pet behavior cases have an underlying pain component – that’s a lot and certainly underscores the importance of learning to recognize potential signs of pain (in addition to just wanting your dog to be comfortable), so you can find the right support for you and your dog. (You can also find Ali sharing lots of great info on her Instagram account!)

As a note: my son woke up from a nap upset and can be heard crying in the first part of the video. My sitter was with him comforting him, but I eventually had to go get him and let him climb on me while I talked to Ali until he was calm enough to head back upstairs with the sitter. I hope this isn’t too distracting as you watch and appreciate all the grace Ali gave me during our chat!

It’s becoming more and more common to see people talking about pain in dogs – why is that?

It’s unlikely that dogs today are just in more pain (though the environment always matters, and there may be certain unique components to this moment in time) but rather that more and more people are learning and sharing about pain in dogs. While social media certainly has its challenges, Ali talked about how it’s allowed all of us to learn from each other instead of just through institutions.

Ali told me, “It really is the kind of thing where once you start to notice signs of potential discomfort, you see it everywhere. And it really changes your framework on what is “a behavior issue” and what is just a living creature with a body and brain like trying to navigate a world … and we hurt a lot of the times?”

What are signs a dog may be in pain if they aren’t visibly limping or yelping?

I’ve learned that more subtle adaptations in a dog’s posture or gait can tell a story about how they are feeling in their body long before the dog is doing something like limping or crying. Ali explained that a lot of the things she and professionals look for in pain assessments are compensation mechanisms. While sometimes pain presents on a palpation, often what she sees when pain is present is an adaptation of sorts, for example: 1) a hesitancy to fully bear weight somewhere (even without it looking like a limp); 2) simply shifting weight in a different way; or 3) a dog may change the way a certain limb lands so that it reduces the force that they’re experiencing.

A lot of times, dogs develop muscle imbalances when they experience pain over time. If a dog isn’t moving their body through the full range of motion that they normally would, the dog will have certain areas that over develop and others under develop. You can see signs of this in posture and gait shifts.

Ali explained that pain in a dog is often not a dog crying and begging for help so much as it is a dog adapting the way they move and hold their body.

For the average person who doesn’t have extensive knowledge of dog conformation, posture, and gait, how might they recognize pain in their dog?

While I think information about how dogs move is pretty fascinating, it’s not an area I know a great deal about. I wondered if Ali thought it was information more people needed in order to spot pain in their dogs, and she said, “I definitely don’t think a formal gait assessment is the be-all-end-all for exploring pain. I think behavior is just as valid as a data point when we’re trying to assess if a dog is potentially experiencing pain. More familiarity with what behaviors are more likely to be linked to pain [would be helpful for people].”

Ultimately, it’s critical to consider a dog's comfort and health as a factor in any and all behavior you see, but here are a few behaviors (that are a bit easier to observe than how your dog is landing and shifting their weight when they hop into a car) that are potential signs of pain:

• A change in what your dog is interested in or willing to do – for example: going up and down the stairs or furniture.

• A sudden change in behavior

• An increase in behavior (e.g. going from barking a couple times on walks to barking a ton on a walk or an increase in licking)

• Sloppy sits or unable to hold a square down position (e.g. reverting to a staggered stand)

• Noise sensitivities and phobias

• More generalized anxiety (certainly there may be specific triggers, but the dog’s baseline is a little “shakier”)

  • Ali explained, “When you’ve experienced (especially chronic) pain, you have what’s called a negative cognitive bias, so you’re just more likely to be more worried about things – to be more pessimistic.”

• Body handling sensitivity, which doesn’t have to be “don’t touch my right front paw” but could be a more general sensitivity. Ali noted that this can be true especially with chronic pain since it interrupts the nervous system and can lead you to be more sensitive overall.

• Reactive behaviors (not always a correlation, but there is a correlation in a large number of dogs we work with)

• Avoiding certain positions

• Instead of dogs being slow when they are in pain (though that could certainly be the case), many actually seem to almost “rely on adrenaline as a pain reliever” and you see dogs who are jumpy, mouthy, and having a hard time settling.

  • Ali shared the example of how she notices and feels her own pain more if her brain is quiet and she is lying down.

Ali emphasized that we need to look for patterns over time – especially with posture. You could pick any single point in time to look at an individual and it wouldn’t be fair to draw a conclusion based on a slouchy posture from that single data point.

But my dog is running around and seems happy? How could they be in pain?