Water Therapy an Alternative Care for Severe Wounds

By David G. Wolf, NGAP Director
Posted:November 23, 2016

Many pets can get severe wounds where there is just not enough skin to close the wound and properly suture. We had one case where a greyhound was hit by a car had significant skin loss. One of the options was amputation, but water therapy was chosen as the alternative. Therapy consisted of spraying the wound daily with warm water for approximately 5 minutes, applying topical antibiotic ointment as well as oral antibiotics, and wrapping the wound with non adhering dressing. This treatment was done on a daily basis. This therapy worked well with all of the dogs that we have tried this on. Water therapy certainly becomes the responsibility for a pet owner if they are willing to do it at home. If not, pet owners will either have to go to their veterinarian on a daily basis or leave their dog in the care of the veterinarian until it has significantly healed; this can be an expensive process. Below are photographs of water therapy.