Appropriate pain control after this little kitten’s chest surgery meant a quick start on physical therapy and a fast return to health!

There’s a running joke in veterinary medicine that our job is harder than human medicine for two reasons, one: that we’re required to treat more than one species and two: that our patients can’t talk to us. While I have no interest in restarting the ‘who has it worse’ argument (especially with close family members who work in human medicine!) I do want to address one of the most difficult parts of veterinary medicine: the where does it hurt conundrum. How do you identify and treat pain in an animal which can’t tell you how much pain it’s in or even why?