Effect of Music on Stress Parameters in Dogs during a Mock Veterinary Visit

Abstract

Veterinary visits can be stressful for dogs, but how their wellbeing changes during a visit is not well understood. Music therapy has been successfully used in clinical practice to alleviate stress and anxiety in people. The present study aimed to understand how canine stress changes during a veterinary visit, establish the effect of music, and highlight measures which may be of practical use. In a randomized crossover design, dogs were exposed to no music and a bespoke piece of classical music at a tempo designed to match their resting heart rate during a mock veterinary visit. Dogs were scored as more “afraid” during the physical examination compared to when they were in the hospital kennel (p < 0.001). Salivary cortisol, IgA, and infrared temperature all increased significantly (p < 0.05) from baseline to post-kennel and post-examination, with no effect of music treatment. Core body temperature (p = 0.010) and the odds of ‘relaxed’ lips (p = 0.020) were lower when dogs were exposed to music compared to control visits. Overall, dogs experienced changes in physiology and behavior, indicative of increased stress, over the course of the visit. Additional research is required to further understand the effect that bespoke music may have in alleviating canine stress during veterinary visits.

Evaluation of indicators of acute emotional states in dogs

“…In the current study surface temperatures of the nose and eye were significantly lower for the high arousal negative valence scenario compared to the high arousal positive valence scenario. This is contrary to previous findings, which have indicated that temperature increases in response to stress 39 , 96 , 113 , 136 . While testing and sampling areas were maintained at consistent temperatures throughout the study, dogs had to walk outside from the car to the sampling room prior to collection of the temperature readings.…”

“…Despite this, numerous studies across a range of species and situations have demonstrated associations between QBA scores and physiological parameters, e.g. 38 , 39 , 120 – 122 . However, some studies have also failed to find an association 123 , 124 .…”

“…Studies in dogs have demonstrated that sIgA decreases in response to both chronic 141 and acute 142 , 143 stress. However, increases in response to acute stress have also been observed 39 . This may be partially due factors such as breed, age, time of day, and individual variation, which have been demonstrated to significantly influence sIgA values 142 , 144 , 145 .…”

“…The dogs were exposed to four scenarios anticipated to induce positive valence emotions: provision of a long-lasting chew (chew); calm petting by a familiar handler (petting); engaging in play with a toy (toy); engaging in a game throwing treats (treat) . Additionally, video footage from previous research exploring five different scenarios anticipated to induce negative valence emotions was reviewed: confinement to the inside portion of their home enclosure whilst isolated from conspecifics (baseline 38 ); social isolation in a familiar room (separation 38 ); housed in a kennel in a vet suite (kennel 39 ); a veterinary examination (consult 39 ); and car travel (car 38 ). Video recordings of dogs experiencing these scenarios were scored by two trained dog behaviour coders on a scale of one to seven for valence (1—very negative, 7—very positive) and arousal (1—no arousal, 7—high arousal) in order to assess if the emotional state induced fell within the required quadrant for a majority of dogs tested.…”

Daily dosing of cannabidiol (CBD) demonstrates a positive effect on measures of stress in dogs during repeated exposure to car travel

“…All videos were scored by two trained raters on a series of behavior attributes using a QBA previously developed to evaluate the welfare of shelter dogs in a mock veterinary setting ( Arena et al., 2019 ; King et al., 2022 ). This QBA was modified to be more relevant to the test (car travel) used in this study, resulting in 17 terms: anxious, alert, calm, comfortable, depressed, explorative, fearful, lethargic, nauseous, nervous, reactive, relaxed, restless, sad, stressed, tense, and uncomfortable.…”