Are Pressure Vests Beneficial at Reducing Stress in Anxious and Fearful Dogs?
a Knowledge Summary by
Louise Anne Buckley PhD, RVN *
*Corresponding Author (louisebuckleydyson@msn.com)
Vol 3, Issue 1 (2018)
Published: 02 Mar 2018
Reviewed by: Sue Badger (MEd, Cert Ed, RVN) and Erik Fausak (MSLIS, MA, CVT, LVT, RLAT)
Next Review date: 02 Sep 2020
DOI: 10.18849/VE.V3I1.152
In fearful or anxious dogs does wearing a pressure vest, compared to not wearing one, result in reduced behavioural and physiological signs of stress?
Clinical bottom lineFour studies of variable quality and limitations were identified that investigated the use of pressure vests, using various physiological and behavioural proxy measures of anxiety. Most behavioural outcome measures associated with a positive effect were subjective assessments, with unblinded assessors. Subjectively, many of the owners believed that pressure vests had a positive effect on their dogs’ anxiety levels.
The take home message for the veterinary professional is that pressure vests may have small but beneficial effects on canine anxiety and that habituating the dog to the vest, assessing for comfort and using repeatedly may improve the likelihood of any benefit. However, the owner should be cautioned that they should not expect their dog’s anxiety to be fully alleviated or prevented, and it may have no beneficial effect at all.
Clinical scenario
During veterinary nursing clinics, the veterinary nurse encounters dogs that the owners describe as being fearful, anxious or stressed in a range of situations (e.g. separation anxiety, noise phobia, etc). Aware that there is a plethora of products available on the market aimed at reducing negative emotional states in dogs, she is keen to ensure that she only recommends products to these clients when there is evidence to support their use. A couple of clients have mentioned the use of pressure vests and have suggested that the veterinary practice stock them for use with other clients, therefore she decides to examine the evidence base for these products.
The evidence
Three studies were identified (Cottam et al., 2013; King et al., 2014; Pekkin et al., 2016) that specifically aimed to test the efficacy of commercially available pressure vests at reducing indices of stress in canines. Of these, only one (Pekkin et al., 2016) reported measuring and standardising the pressure exerted by the vests, the other two papers reported fitting (or asking owners to fit) the vests firmly in accordance with the manufacturers’ instructions. On this basis, a fourth paper (Fish et al., 2017) that looked at the effect of fitting a telemetry vest (the authors report snuggly fitting these spandex vests) on physiological and behavioural parameters of dogs exposed to a stressor was also included. A fifth paper (Cottam and Dodman, 2009) was identified that also used an item of torso clothing (a cape) to use reduce stress in dogs naturalistically exposed to thunderstorms. However, this study was devised to examine the effects of an anti-static lining, and both the control and the experimental dogs wore capes (both of which reduced the anxiety levels of dogs exposed to thunderstorms). Furthermore, the authors do not report fitting the cape firmly (or any other adjective to indicate that the cape exerted pressure on the torso). Thus, this paper was not included in the evidence summary.
Summary of the evidence
| Population: | Healthy, house-trained dogs fearful of thunderstorms and living in one of 11 American states known for having frequent thunderstorms and whose owners responded to an advert in the Vet School newsletter. Dogs had to meet the inclusion criteria to be designated ‘thunderstorm wary’ and not currently be on any pharmacological treatment for this fear.
Inclusion criteria (based on owner self-reporting):
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| Sample size: | 32 dogs started the study, but only 18 dogs could be used for the Thunderstorm Anxiety Score analysis, and only 19 dogs could be used to answer the overall effectiveness of the Anxiety Wrap analysis.
Further details. 32 dogs started the study. This reduced to 26 at the end of the baseline phase. This reduced to 21 dogs by the end of the experimental phase, but not all these provided enough material to be used in all analyses. Drop-outs were defined based upon completed surveys at the end of each stage. No explanation is given for the drop outs at the end of the baseline phase. Of the five owners who did not complete the survey at the end of the experimental phase, the reasons were as follows (one dog per reason): risk of aggression during fitting vest, medical illness, no reason, failed to return form, and vest the wrong size. Of the 21 remaining dogs, three failed to complete surveys for five thunderstorm episodes during the experimental phase (reduced to 18 for the related analysis). For the overall effectiveness score, owners of dogs that had experienced three or more thunderstorms while wearing the Anxiety Wrap were eligible to be included. This reduced the sample from 21 to 20. A further owner failed to provide an overall effectiveness score, reducing the sample for this section to 19. |
| Intervention details: | The intervention evaluated for efficacy at reducing anxiety during thunderstorms was the commercially available Anxiety Wrap (Animals Plus LLC, Huntington, IN), and animals were used as their own control in a before treatment/during treatment clinical trial.
Study design: The clinical trial was divided into two phases:
Owners completed a questionnaire after each thunderstorm, that asked the owner to provide the following information:
Owners of dogs included were requested to discontinue (for the duration of the study) any other treatments they currently used for the treatment or management of thunderstorm fear. Post-trial: Owners were asked to complete a survey that assessed how effective they felt the Anxiety Wrap was at reducing their dog’s thunderstorm phobia. Further information: Sample selection: The first 32 dogs whose owners responded to the newsletter advert and who met the inclusion criteria were included in this study. Exposure to the Anxiety Wrap: Owners were provided with an Anxiety Wrap given directions on how to fit and remove it and instructed to fit it during thunderstorms. They were also asked to practice fitting it once before a thunderstorm (and to associate its fitting with a reward for the dog) and three times during non-stormy days (to prevent the dog associating the vest with thunderstorms). |
| Study design: | Clinical trial |
| Outcome Studied: | The main three outcome measures relevant to answering this PICO were:
The Thunderstorm Anxiety Score was generated from the nine inclusion criteria behavior (except escape/damage). For each storm, owners had to report whether the dog showed the specific behavior (yes / no?). If yes, the owner was asked additional question(s) about the intensity/frequency/duration of the behavior (varied according to behavior). This was done to assess anxiety severity and a score (maximum 5 per behavior, 45 if all behaviours exhibited at maximum severity) awarded. As not all dogs showed all behaviours, the authors converted the resultant score into a ratio based upon the number of points awarded for behavior severity, divided by the maximum number of points it could have obtained given the behaviours shown: i.e. the actual score divided by (5 multiplied by the number of behaviours for which the owner answered “yes” the dog displayed this behavior during the thunderstorm) = the standardised ratio score. Thunderstorm severity was also analysed to look for interactions between Thunderstorm Anxiety Score and thunderstorm severity (e.g. do dogs show more severe levels of Thunderstorm Anxiety Score when thunderstorms are particularly bad?) |
| Main Findings (relevant to PICO question): |
Thunderstorm Anxiety Score:
Individual anxiety signs:
Overall effectiveness:
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| Limitations: |
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| Population: | Anxious juvenile and adult (i.e. > 6 months) pet dogs with no other health problems.
To qualify as “anxious” dogs needed to be diagnosed by a veterinarian or animal behaviourist as having one of the following conditions:
No breed restrictions were in place and the dogs used were a variety of sizes and breeds or crossbreeds. Some dogs were on anti-anxiety medications at the time of the study. |
| Sample size: | Total number of dogs used: 90 (SA: n = 50; GAC: n = 40), with 30 dogs per treatment group. |
| Intervention details: | The intervention that was evaluated for efficacy was the Thundershirt® (a commercially available pressure vest). Dogs were randomly allocated to one of three treatment groups (all n = 30):
All dogs also wore a heart rate monitor strapped over their chest. Experimental design:
The outcome measures studied (heart rate and behaviour) are detailed below.
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| Study design: | Randomised controlled trial |
| Outcome Studied: |
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| Main Findings (relevant to PICO question): |
Average heart rate:
Maximum heart rate:
Behavioural signs of anxiety:
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| Limitations: |
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| Population: | Finnish-based adult dogs (various breeds, both genders and either neuter status) known to usually (60 – 100% of occasions) react fearfully to fireworks.
Firework fear was assessed using a validated questionnaire (Tiira & Lohi, 2014) that had a good test-retest reliability when assessing noise-related fears. The questionnaire was completed by the dogs’ owners. The questionnaire provided the authors with a measure of the dogs’ noise reactivity, noise fear frequency, and general fearfulness. Exclusion criteria: fear towards strange people or situations, bitches in season, dogs using regular medication (other than non-steroid anti-inflammatories). |
| Sample size: | 28 dogs were recruited to the study.
A full set of data was not collected for each dog. For the oxytocin analysis, two urine samples were obtained from 24 of the dogs. For the cortisol analysis, four saliva samples were obtained from 20 dogs. For the behavioural analysis, 25 dogs participated in all tests. |
| Intervention details: | The intervention that was evaluated for efficacy was the Lymed AnimalTM Supporting Garments (a commercially available pressure vest). There were three treatment groups, with each dog planned to experience each of the treatments. The three treatment groups were:
Dogs were semi-randomly allocated (balanced for gender) to one of three groups, with each group experiencing the three treatments in a different order. The study was divided into three main sections:
Further details of each phase are below: First section: The dog (and owner) are given 30 minutes to habituate to the experimental room before a urine sample is taken. A pressure vest is then fitted, and a 30-minute habituation period allowed before a second urine sample is taken. The vest is then removed. Second section: This section is repeated three times (one per treatment), a minimum of one week apart. A saliva sample is taken and then the dog has a vest is fitted / handled as if one was being fitted (dependent upon treatment phase). The dog and owner (separated from dog) then wait in the test arena for 20 minutes before a second saliva sample is taken. Video recording then commences (no experimenter present) for six minutes to identify the dog’s behavior under the following conditions:
Third and fourth saliva samples are taken after a further 18 and 38 minutes respectively. A person that was blind to both the study aims and treatment then watched the videos and recorded the dogs’ behaviour using the ethogram provided (see outcome measures). Third section: The owner was sent two follow up questionnaires (one two months after the study finished, one just after New Year’s Eve) that asked about vest use and perceived efficacy generally or specifically on New Year’s Eve. |
| Study design: | Randomised controlled trial |
| Outcome Studied: | The outcome measures studied that were relevant to addressing the PICO included:
Physiological:
Behavioural:
Owner self – reporting (survey data):
|
| Main Findings (relevant to PICO question): |
Selected findings (directly relevant to the PICO):
Physiological:
Behavioural:
Owner reports:
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| Limitations: |
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| Population: | Adult, male and female field-trial-bred Labrador Retrievers purchased by a military training facility and kennel housed at the research facility that carried out this study. Dogs had been used in previous studies, including one using telemetry vests and one utilizing the Open-field Test (OFT). |
| Sample size: | 16 dogs (8 per treatment group) |
| Intervention details: | The intervention was the wearing of a telemetry vest during testing within the OFT.
Two treatment groups:
Each dog was given three OFTs, held on three consecutive days, and each of nine minutes duration. During tests one and three, dogs were exposed to no auditory stimuli while in the OFT area. During test two, dogs were exposed to a thunderstorm audio recording during the middle three minutes of the nine-minute test. Dogs were filmed during the OFT for later anxiety scoring using one partially-blinded, trained observer (blind to thunderstorm stimulus occurrence, not blind to vest wearing). Immediately prior to each OFT, a telemetry vest was fitted to each dog, and the dog’s heart rate and temperature were then manually recorded. The vest was then left on (Vest dogs) or removed (No Vest dogs) for the OFT. Immediately after the OFT, the dog’s heart rate and temperature were manually recorded again. Further detail: The spandex vest was standardised for pressure by fitting the vest to each dog tight enough to only allow two fingers to be inserted under the vest. Dogs were allocated to treatment group using a randomised match-pairs design. They were pair ranked (lowest to highest value) according to their Global Anxiety Score (obtained in a previous study, Gruen et al. 2015), and then the first of each pair member randomly allocated to either the Vest or No Vest group, and the remaining pair member allocated to the alternative group. |
| Study design: | Randomised controlled trial |
| Outcome Studied: | Outcomes relevant to addressing the PICO included: Physiological data:
Behavioural data:
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| Main Findings (relevant to PICO question): |
Findings relevant to the PICO: Physiological data:
Behavioural data:
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| Limitations: |
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Appraisal, application and reflection
In terms of external relevance, of the studies that were included, three of the papers (Cottam et al., 2013; Pekkin et al., 2016; Fish et al., 2017) used noise stressors (thunderstorm, firework or thunderstorm sound recordings respectively) to induce an anxiety or fear response. The stressors have external relevance as thunderstorms, fireworks and separation-related stress are all stressors that clients will frequently approach veterinary professionals to seek assistance with the management or treatment of their dog’s negative response towards. However, whilst the Cottam et al. (2013) study used field data based on known thunderstorm-fearful dogs’ responses to actual thunderstorms whilst in their home environment, the other studies used study designs that may have reduced the applicability of the study findings in a real-life scenario.
The three studies investigating commercially available pressure vests all selected pet dogs drawn from a population of dogs known to be fearful or anxious of either the sound stressor used in the study (Cottam et al., 2013; Pekkin et al., 2016) or of having separation anxiety or a generalised anxiety disorder relevant to triggering anxiety under the isolation kennel facilities (King et al., 2014). Thus, applicability to client-owned dogs is likely to be good from this perspective. The Fish et al. (2017) study was more problematic in this respect. These were kennelled dogs, drawn from military working dogs and housed under research conditions. Although the dogs were scored using a global anxiety score (scores carried over from a previous study, Gruen et al., 2015) this was undertaken to allocate dogs evenly across treatment groups, and being anxious (either specifically in response to thunderstorms or more generally) was not part of any inclusion criteria. Although dogs per se will clearly all experience fear and anxiety at some point (and the data in this study indicates that these dogs did show an increase in their anxiety score during testing compared with the mean global anxiety score), clients seeking assistance or advice may be disproportionately drawn from dogs known to be fearful or anxious (or, more severely so) in the presence of a given stressor. Thus, the dogs studied in this study may differ from those we wish to apply any findings too and this should be borne in mind.
In terms of internal validity, each of the studies had its merits and limitations. The Cottam et al. (2013) study was a field-based, clearly client-relevant, commercially funded study that relied heavily on owner reporting of behaviour. The authors reported that the use of a pressure vest, compared with baseline measurements, was associated with a numerical reduction on the anxiety scores during all thunderstorms in the treatment phase. However, only during treatment thunderstorms 4 and 5, was the mean anxiety score sufficiently lower than the baseline anxiety score for any potential difference to be significant. This downward trend in anxiety scores may suggest that there may be an element of associative learning to any therapeutic effect of pressure vest use. Owners reported a variable level of efficacy, but most owners felt that the vest had some positive effect on their dog’s thunderstorm fear. However, the owners were not blinded to treatment, and thus there is a high risk of placebo effect or bias being present in the reporting of these results. However, with a cautionary note that the Thunderstorm Anxiety Score is an un-validated method for quantifying thunderstorm anxiety severity, this study does provide some limited evidence of a beneficial effect of pressure vests on dog anxiety during thunderstorms.
The King et al. (2014) paper used a positive control (loose fitting vest) as well as a traditional control group that allowed the authors to identify whether any apparent benefit of wearing a pressure vest was due to simply wearing an item of clothing (e.g. dogs associated it with going for a pleasant walk) or genuinely an effect of pressure exerted on the dog’s torso. The strongest finding in this study was the demonstration that dogs in the snug fit vest group showed a decrease in heart rate between the baseline (pre-kennel/isolation) and the average heart rate of the dog when in the kennel for 15 minutes. This contrasted with both other treatment groups which demonstrated the converse. The behavioural data also demonstrated that snug fit dogs spent less time orientating towards the door (53% of dogs, as compared to 67% of loose fit dogs, and 90% of control dogs). This is more problematic to interpret as this would suggest that wearing a vest per se reduced door orientation behaviour. These dogs were not habituated to pressure vest wearing at the start of the study and the authors do not report information regarding the dogs’ prior coat-wearing history so it is difficult to assess the likelihood of this alternative interpretation. The authors report a statistical tendency for snug fit dogs to show less yawning and tongue flicking but their statistical handling and reporting of this data made it more problematic to draw conclusions from the behavioural output. They report the data was highly skewed and use a non-parametric test to undertake inferential testing but then report the data using the mean (± standard deviation) which makes independent interpretation of the data problematic. However, the study does provide some evidence that a pressure vest can reduce a physiological measure of arousal during short term isolation from the owner/confinement to an unfamiliar area.
Also commercially funded, the Pekkin et al. (2016) study found very little evidence of pressure vests having a beneficial effect in their main study (though the owners, when surveyed, subsequently reported a positive effect under field conditions). No physiological parameters (oxytocin, cortisol) were affected by wearing a pressure vest (either fitted loosely or firmly), but the cortisol levels increased post-audio stressor across all treatment groups, suggesting that the dogs did find the audio-stressor stressful. However, when the dogs were wearing a firmly fitted vest they spent less time laying down during the audio-stressor than under either other treatment condition, and laying down behaviour was (independent of treatment) shown to be positively correlated with fear. This might indicate that, when wearing a firmly fitted vest, dogs felt less fearful during the audio recording of fireworks. However, it cannot be discounted that lying down in a tight-fitting vest is less comfortable than when wearing a vest loosely or no vest at all. No other behaviour parameters were affected by treatment. The weakest part of this study was the owner survey which was very sensitive to bias and the placebo effect. However, the main study may provide some very limited evidence that firmly fitted pressure vests may have a positive impact on one behavioural sign of canine anxiety, but this would be more convincing if more of the outcome variables were affected by a firmly fitted pressure vest and more research is needed here.
The Fish et al. (2017) study reported that the use of a telemetry vest resulted in a lower heart rate, lower anxiety scores during the open field tests and reduced increase in anxiety score during the audio recording of thunder, compared with dogs not wearing a vest. However, a small sample size (n= 8 per group) and methodological issues reduce the reliability of these findings (particularly, the significant difference in heart rates between treatment groups). Further research, using a large sample size (determined using a power calculation) would be beneficial here.
In conclusion, four studies of variable quality and limitations were identified that investigated the use of pressure vests, using various physiological and behavioural proxy measures of anxiety. Most behavioural outcome measures associated with a positive effect were subjective assessments, with unblinded assessors. Differences between study designs, stressors and outcome measures used, and what parameters were affected by pressure vest wearing make it difficult to meaningfully triangulate findings and draw firmer conclusions. The take home message for the veterinary professional is that pressure vests may have small but beneficial effects on canine anxiety and that habituating the dog to the vest, assessing for comfort and using repeatedly may improve the likelihood of any benefit. However, the owner should be cautioned that they should not expect their dog’s anxiety to be fully alleviated or prevented, and it may have no beneficial effect at all.
Methodology Section
| Search Strategy | |
| Databases searched and dates covered: | Pubmed (1900 – 14/09/2017); Science Direct (1901 – 14/09/2017); CAB Abstracts (1973 – 2017, week 35) |
| Search terms: | Pubmed:
(dog OR dogs OR canine OR bitch OR bitches OR canid OR puppy OR puppies) AND (vest OR shirt OR jacket OR coat OR wrap OR cape) AND (anxiety OR anxious OR fear OR fearful OR stress OR stressed OR stressful OR panic OR phobi*) Science Direct: Restricted to: <Advanced search><journals only><title-abstr-key> (dog OR dogs OR canine OR bitch OR bitches OR canid OR puppy OR puppies) AND (vest OR shirt OR jacket OR coat OR wrap OR cape) AND (anxiety OR anxious OR fear OR fearful OR stress OR stressed OR stressful OR panic OR phobi*) CAB Abstracts: 1 (dog or dogs or canine or bitch or bitches or canid or puppy or puppies).mp. [mp=abstract, title, original title, broad terms, heading words, identifiers, cabicodes] (195323) 2 (vest or shirt or jacket or coat or wrap or cape).mp. [mp=abstract, title, original title, broad terms, heading words, identifiers, cabicodes] (40414) 3 (anxiety or anxious or fear or fearful or stress or stressed or stressful or panic or phobi*).mp. [mp=abstract, title, original title, broad terms, heading words, identifiers, cabicodes] (311937) 4 1 and 2 and 3 (36) |
| Dates searches performed: | Pubmed: 14/09/2017; Science Direct: 14/09/2017; CAB Abstracts: 11/09/2017 |
| Exclusion / Inclusion Criteria | |
| Exclusion: | Pre-defined exclusion criteria: non-English language, popular press articles, conference abstracts |
| Inclusion: | Any comparative (control group utilised) study in which the effect of pressure vests on anxiety (or similar) in dogs was studied. |
| Search Outcome | ||||||
|
Database |
Number of results |
Excluded – did not answer PICO question |
Excluded – not English language |
Excluded – conference abstract only |
Excluded – duplicates |
Total relevant papers |
|
PubMed |
41 | 40 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
|
Science Direct |
35 | 32 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 |
|
CAB Abstracts |
36 | 30 | 0 | 1 | 5 | 0 |
|
Total relevant papers when duplicates removed |
4 | |||||
The author declares no conflicts of interest.
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Knowledge Summaries are a peer-reviewed article type which aims to answer a clinical question based on the best available current evidence. It does not override the responsibility of the practitioner. Informed decisions should be made by considering such factors as individual clinical expertise and judgement along with patient’s circumstances and owners’ values. Knowledge Summaries are a resource to help inform and any opinions expressed within the Knowledge Summaries are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect the view of the RCVS Knowledge.
