
09/07/2025
Did you know that slippery floors (laminate, wood, lino, and tiles, for example) pose a threat to your dog’s joints? Not just the floors themselves but also rugs that shift and slide about on top of those floors. Such surfaces can be very difficult for dogs already suffering from musculoskeletal issues to negotiate, but even in dogs without such issues, a constant lack of stability in the home can create small microtraumas, the cumulative effects of which can create joint problems for them which might easily have been prevented.
So what can you do?
Firstly, help your dogs to achieve greater stability around your home by providing non-slip surfaces for them to move about on. Whilst you might not be able to lay entirely non-slip flooring throughout your home (although if you did want to do this, then companies like Floors For Paws specialise in flooring that is designed to be both hard-wearing as well as anti-slip), you can ensure that there are some carpeted areas in your home, or that you provide non-slip rugs or yoga mats for your dogs to move about on, or that you put anti-slip tape on otherwise slippery surfaces that allow your dogs to move about more comfortably from room to room.
Secondly, you should ensure that you are not playing games in the home that encourage your dogs to run across unstable surfaces.
Helping our dogs to live a life as free from pain as possible is just one of the many ways in which we can fulfil our duty of care to them. It is also the case that there is a well-established relationship between pain and behaviour, so anything that you can do to minimise the former in your dog will ultimately have a positive effect on the latter.
So let’s get a grip and help our dogs to live the comfortable lives that they deserve.