Preparing for visits to the Vets
Visiting the vets is a necessary part of a dog’s life. Acclimatising your puppy to the handling and some of the other procedures that may happen there can go a long way towards helping them be calm and relaxed at the vets.
To be a good patient, your puppy will need to accept:
- Handling (informal handling, handling for clinical examination and being handled by strangers)
- Being on a table
- Having nails clipped
- Being muzzled
It's important to practice all of these regularly whilst your puppy is still young.
In addition, your veterinary practice may let you visit the surgery with your puppy whilst they are growing up. Take food treats and give them to the staff to give your puppy so they have pleasant encounters with everyone they meet.
If they will let you, or have time to help you, put your puppy up on the table and handle them all over as a vet would to examine them (having first accustomed them to this at home), and put them on the weighing scale so that they get used to this too.
Take advantage of any puppy parties run by your vets. These are a great way to develop a relationship with the staff as well as getting your puppy used to all the sights and smells of the surgery in a relaxed informal way.
Taking the trouble to get your puppy used to the vets early in life will make it much easier to handle if they become sick or injured. Since they will not be so stressed or anxious at the vets, they are likely to be a more compliant patient and to get better more quickly too.
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