Fellow: Kelly McMullin

Mentor: Christopher Frye

Co-Mentor: Jonathan Wood

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): 

The chief purpose of this prospective, controlled trial is to determine whether the addition of in-hospital underwater treadmill therapy results in a more rapid and/or complete recovery than a standardized home exercise program alone in T3-L3 neurolocalized paraplegic dogs undergoing hemilaminectomy for T10-L4 intervertebral disc disease (IVDD). Treatment and control groups will be assigned based on client willingness to participate in underwater treadmill (UWTM) therapy. The treatment group for this study will undergo UWTM beginning 2 weeks after surgery once the incision is healed. The first 2 weeks of hydrotherapy will be conducted 3 times per week, while the remaining 4 sessions will be conducted twice weekly until the 6-week neurological recheck (a total of 10 water therapy sessions distributed from weeks 2-6 post-operatively). Both the treatment and control groups will be provided the same standardized home exercise program complete with instructions and video demonstrations. Dogs will be blindly assigned a Modified Frankel Score (MFS) by a veterinary neurologist pre-operatively, postoperatively prior to discharge, and 6 weeks postoperatively. Client specific outcome measures will include a weekly quality of life (QOL) visual analog scale, home exercise compliance journal (HEJ), bladder management scale (BMS), and a basic activities of daily living (BADL) scale. Furthermore, time to unassisted ambulation (TUA) will be monitored and reported.

Our hypothesis is that dogs receiving regular in-hospital hydrotherapy in addition to a home exercise program after hemilaminectomy will recover more quickly and more completely than dogs who participate in a home exercise program alone.