Adapting the home for a senior dog or cat

The goal is not to work out whether the animal has aged, which is obvious enough, but to know exactly where in the house it loses independence. Keep a note on your phone for three days and write things down as they happen rather than in the evening: the details that matter are small and they fade within hours.

• The exact spots where paws slip, usually at the edge of a rug, on a turn and at the point where the animal gets up from its bed.
• The jumps it now avoids: which surfaces it reached a year ago and now looks at without climbing.
• The number of attempts before getting onto the sofa or the bed, which is the most sensitive indicator of pain.
• Night waking, the time it happens and the spot in the house where the animal stops looking disoriented.
• The times it just misses the litter tray or soils right beside it, which almost always means the rim is too high rather than a behaviour problem.
• How much time passes between one drink and the next, and which bowl the animal actually uses.
• Hesitation in front of glass doors, stairs and changes of surface, which points to failing sight before any other sign.

1. 1

   Draw the routes the animal actually uses

   On a floor plan or a sheet of paper, trace the three or four lines walked every day: bed to water, bed to door, sofa to litter tray. The work concentrates on those lines rather than on the whole floor area, which would cost far more without adding safety.

2. 2

   Cover the routes with continuous runners

   One long runner beats five separate mats: the critical point is always the transition from grippy surface to smooth one. Runners must be washable and have a rubber backing rather than a fabric one, otherwise they become a sliding surface in their own right.

3. 3

   Fix the edges and remove curled corners

   A curling corner is the first place a hind paw catches. Use an adhesive underlay or double sided tape along the whole perimeter, and check the edges every time you vacuum.

4. 4

   Put a mat under the bowls

   The feeding spot is where the animal stands longest with its weight shifted forward, and on a smooth floor the front legs splay outwards. A rubber backed mat under the bowl solves a problem almost nobody connects with mealtimes.

5. 5

   Protect the foot of the stairs and the thresholds

   The top two and bottom two steps are where falls happen. Fit non slip strips to every step or cover the staircase with a fixed runner, and level thresholds between rooms with a ramped profile wherever they exceed 2 centimetres.

6. 6

   Trim the hair between the pads

   In long haired dogs and cats the tuft growing between the pads works like a ski on wood flooring. Trim it flush with the pad using round tipped scissors every three to four weeks; on its own it visibly changes the grip.

7. 7

   Keep nails at the correct length

   A long nail lifts the toe and stops the pad making proper contact. The length is right when the nail does not touch the floor while the animal stands: if you hear clicking on wood flooring, they need shortening.

8. 8

   Light the night routes

   Small plug in lights along the line that leads to water and to the litter tray, on from dusk to dawn. In senior animals vision in low light deteriorates well before daytime vision, and night time disorientation is often just darkness.

9. 9

   Walk every route with the animal

   The final step is to accompany it along each route and watch the hind legs rather than the head. Every point where you see a paw slip even slightly is still uncovered, and there are usually two or three left after the first pass.

• Every ramp needs a textured surface or cross battens every 20 centimetres, otherwise it becomes a slide.
• Ramps are introduced with treats and flat on the ground before any incline: an animal that slips on its first climb will never use one again.
• Intermediate steps must be stable under the animal's full weight without rocking: an unstable landing frightens more than an excessive height.
• For cats it is worth keeping at least one vertical route, because giving up height altogether reduces exploration and muscle tone: lower the stages, do not remove them.
• Measure heights with a tape rather than by eye, because visual estimates are usually out by ten centimetres in one direction or the other.

An animal that sees less navigates from its memory of the space, so the main rule is stability: furniture stays where it is, bowls do not move, and new objects never end up in the middle of a route. If you must change the layout, do it one element at a time and walk the new path with the animal for two days.

• Routes kept clear of movable obstacles: chairs pushed under the table, boxes never left along the line, shoes picked up.
• Colour contrast between rug and floor, because in failing vision contrast is lost before detail.
• Night lights along the main routes and a light left on in the room where the animal sleeps if it wakes disoriented.
• With a deaf animal, always approach within its field of view and use a consistent tactile signal, such as a hand on the shoulder, before touching anywhere else.
• Do not move the water bowl even half a metre, and if you must, keep the old position occupied for a week with a second bowl.
• A gate at the top of the stairs once night time disorientation appears, because falling down stairs is the most serious domestic accident in senior animals.

• One litter tray per floor of the house, and in any case one more than the number of cats, because a senior cat will not willingly tackle stairs and long corridors.
• A tray at least one and a half times the cat's length from nose to base of tail, with a lowered entry and no hood, which forces the neck to bend.
• Fine substrate 3 to 4 centimetres deep, because a hard base is uncomfortable for painful joints.
• Water in at least two or three places, always away from the litter tray, in a wide bowl that does not touch a cat's whiskers.
• Bowls resting on a non slip mat; whether to raise them is decided with your vet on the basis of posture and diagnosis, not out of habit.
• For a dog with reduced continence, more frequent outings at fixed times and an absorbent pad near the door, with accidents never told off.
• Food bowl away from thoroughfares and from where other pets pass, because a senior animal interrupted mid meal often simply gives up.

The right setup today is not the right setup in six months, because mobility changes slowly and continuously. Schedule a review every three months and treat it as a short check: repeat the three days of observation in reduced form, measure again the heights the animal actually clears, and correct one element at a time.

• Recheck the edges of the runners and replace any that have lost their rubber backing.
• Measure again the maximum height the animal clears without hesitating, and compare it with the previous quarter.
• Check the hair between the pads and the nail length, which wears down less in a less active senior.
• Check the night lights and their batteries, if they run on batteries.
• Update the note with the changes you have seen and take it to the next appointment along with your questions about pain.