Rehabilitation to Return-to-Work for Working Dogs.

This article highlights the differences between working dog careers, unique protocols associated with health care of a working dog and provides a practical guide to creating and managing a return-to-work program. The rehabilitative approach to a working dog consists of four distinct sequential phases: activity restriction, rehabilitation, return-to-work, and maintenance. The timeline through each phase is dependent on the degree of injury, treatment intervention, prior health status of the dog, and compliance of the handler.

A Formalized Method to Acclimate Dogs to Voluntary Treadmill Locomotion at Various Speeds and Inclines.

The land treadmill is a multipurpose tool with a unique set of behavioral and physical benefits for training and assessing active dogs. Habituation to voluntary treadmill locomotion is crucial for training a dog or accurately assessing a dog's fitness on a treadmill. Therefore, a treadmill acclimation program was developed and evaluated with working dogs in training or working dogs performing detection research.

Expert Perspectives on the Performance of Explosive Detection Canines: Performance Degrading Factors.

The explosive detection canine (EDC) team is currently the best available mobile sensor capability in the fight against explosive threats. While the EDC can perform at a high level, the EDC team faces numerous factors during the search process that may degrade performance. Understanding these factors is key to effective selection, training, assessment, deployment, and operationalizable research.

Expert Perspectives on the Performance of Explosive Detection Canines: Operational Requirements.

Explosive detection canines (EDC) play an important role in protecting people and property. The utilization of and research on EDCs is often based on personal experience or incomplete knowledge. EDC practitioners (handlers, trainers, and leaders) possess the institutional knowledge necessary to understand EDC operational requirements.

Sports Medicine and Rehabilitation in Working Dogs.

Canine sports medicine and rehabilitation recently have evolved to embody the optimization of performance, injury prevention, and mitigation of musculoskeletal degeneration. This article discusses the diverse factors and considerations of working dog wellness and injury prevention and the importance of recognizing normal and abnormal posture and anatomic structure for performance evaluation and early indication of musculoskeletal injury. The importance of a canine physical fitness program is highlighted and the need for a 4-phase recovery plan to determine if a working dog can safely return to work after injury discussed.

The Penn Vet Working Dog Center Fit to Work Program: A Formalized Method for Assessing and Developing Foundational Canine Physical Fitness.

Fit to Work is a formalized working dog foundational physical fitness assessment and development program. The Penn Vet Working Dog Center developed this program to address the needs of working dog handlers, trainers, and programs for simple, effective, and efficient methods to develop and assess working dog physical fitness. Fit to Work focuses on the foundational fitness modalities of strength, stability, mobility, and proprioception.