Rehabilitation

Veterinary medicine is seeing an increasing number of increasingly serious conditions suffered by animals domesticated by humans. The set of specialisations at the Kurosz Clinic illustrates the progress of veterinary medicine, which is slowly beginning to catch up with the level of sophistication of human medicine.

Animal rehabilitation complements mainstream therapy in areas such as:

• treatment of post-accident injuries
• oncology
• neurological disorders
• dermatology
• cardiology

Rehabilitation is the restoration of the patient to normal physical, mental and social functioning after injuries of various types or long-term, exhaustive treatment.

Rehabilitation of dogs

By far the most popular is rehabilitation for dogs. This is closely followed by cat rehabilitation and equine rehabilitation. This is, of course, partly due to the numerical predominance of ‘dog people’ over ‘cat people’, but also because of the treatments specific to these animals. The rehabilitation of a dog with discopathy or after a cruciate ligament rupture has already become entrenched in the minds of carers and comes as no surprise to anyone.

Types of animal rehabilitation

The term rehabilitation covers different types of rehabilitation depending on the methods used to stimulate the patient.

• Kinesitherapy– (from the Greek kinesis – movement) consists of treatment with movement. It consists of passive exercises using external force, i.e. the force of the therapist: flexion, extension, rotation, adduction, abduction and stretching, as well as active exercises that take place thanks to the contraction induced by the animal. Among the many exercises, it is the range of motion (ROM) and stretching exercises that are of paramount importance to achieve better joint mobility and increase flexibility, by stimulating the muscles and nervous system. Active exercise is undoubtedly one of the most valuable methods to aid the healing process in canine rehabilitation.
• Physical therapy– uses naturally occurring physical factors, e.g. temperature, water, electricity, light, UV and infrared radiation, ultrasound (hydrotherapy, magnetotherapy, laser therapy, electrotherapy, sonotherapy, shock wave therapy, cold therapy, heat therapy, heliotherapy).
• Massage– manipulations on the soft tissues of the body.

Advantages of rehabilitation treatments in different veterinary specialties

The treatments offered at the KUROSZ Clinic are aimed at patients suffering from a variety of conditions, which we treat within a number of veterinary specialities:

• Surgery and orthopaedics– following surgical procedures, mainly orthopaedic, but not exclusively. Musculoskeletal rehabilitation reduces soreness after surgery and prevents muscle contractures. It is used for inflammation of muscles, bursae, joints and for sprains and dislocations of limbs.
• Geriatrics– for spinal degeneration it has an analgesic and anti-inflammatory effect. Also used for muscular atrophy.
• Neurology– for proprioception disorders, balance problems, back pain, neuralgia, and facial nerve inflammation.
• Dermatology– for non-healing wounds, ulcers, abscesses, bruises, haematomas, lichen, sores, burns, scarring and dermatitis.
• Dentistry– used for gingivitis, pain control, tooth fractures, buccal or other intra-oral haematomas, as a post-operative healing accelerator, and in temporomandibular joint problems.

Veterinary rehabilitation visit

This is a very important visit, during which precise information is gathered about the animal, the most important problems are identified and a specific and individual action plan is established, i.e. the type and number of treatments necessary to achieve a specific goal (depending on the type of treatment, these would need to be repeated 5-10 times, sometimes 2-3 times a week).

Patients can be referred for the following treatments at our clinic:

• Laser therapy
• Magnet therapy
• Electro-biostimulation
• Ultrasound