Attention Pet Owners, Vet Shows How To Perform The Heimlich Maneuver

Andrew is veterinarian at the Animal Emergency Center & Specialty Services and demonstrates two methods showcasing how to perform the Heimlich maneuver on your dog.Show more

If you ever have the unfortunate event where a choking incident was to occur you should know how to save your dog's life.

First thing to know are the typical signs of choking, and you first need to check if the gums of the dog are blue, that can be a sign of choking. Also, dogs often can be pawing at their face quite frantically but won't be making any noise like coughing or gagging.

First thing to do is to open dog's mouth and swipe the back of the throat with your fingers and remove anything that is abnormal. Sometimes the foreign body that can be lodged quite far back in their throat and then you should perform the Heimlich maneuver.

There are two ways to do that move in dogs. One is to perform a quick thrust to the chest which can be performed if they are lying on the side, over the widest part of the chest, take both hands and give a quick trust to the chest. That will hopefully dislodge the object from the throat, and then again open their mouth and sweep their throat.

The second way, particularly performed on larger dogs, is like it is done in people, stand or kneel behind the dog, and lift them up to stand on their back legs and take your fist and go up and under the back of their sternum and do a quick upward and forward trust with both hands ideally.

Hopefully this never comes across, but if it does happen, you will know how to help your dog.

Credit to 'Animal Emergency Center & Specialty Services'