Farr Brian, Gabrysiak Jorie, Traylor Rosemary, Zayas Sofia, Ramos Meghan, Mallikarjun Amritha, Otto Cynthia
Department of Defense Military Working Dog Veterinary Service, Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland, San Antonio, TX, United States.
Penn Vet Working Dog Center, Clinical Sciences and Advanced Medicine, School of Veterinary Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, United States.
Front Vet Sci. 2023 Jul 3;10:1217201. doi: 10.3389/fvets.2023.1217201. eCollection 2023.
Working, sporting, and companion dogs require muscular fitness to perform their daily tasks, competitive activities, and operational functions effectively and with a low risk of injury. There are currently no methods to measure the muscular fitness of dogs who are not debilitated. Sprint performance is highly correlated with muscular fitness in humans, and various sprint assessments are used to measure performance for sporting and tactical athletes. The Penn Vet Working Dog Center Sprint Test (ST) is a 25 m maximal effort sprint from a down position and was developed to be a low-cost measure of muscular fitness suitable for field use. The purpose of this project was to describe the refinements to the ST, detail the performance and measurement protocol, evaluate the measurement inter-rater and intra-rater reliability, characterize the acceleration profile, and explore the inter-day reliability. Both naïve and experienced raters demonstrated excellent intra-rater and inter-rater reliability. The acceleration profile of the dogs in this study was similar to that of average adult human sprinters and demonstrated the role of muscular fitness in performance over this short distance. Finally, a small group of dogs showed moderate inter-day reliability and provided initial performance data to inform future studies. The ST appears to be a reliable measure of canine muscular fitness and could be used to assess performance in healthy dogs and guide the return to sport or work of debilitated dogs.
工作犬、运动犬和伴侣犬需要具备肌肉适应性，才能有效地完成日常任务、竞技活动和执行功能，同时降低受伤风险。目前尚无测量非虚弱犬肌肉适应性的方法。短跑成绩与人类的肌肉适应性高度相关，各种短跑评估被用于衡量运动和战术运动员的表现。宾夕法尼亚大学兽医学院工作犬中心短跑测试（ST）是从俯卧姿势开始的25米全力短跑测试，旨在成为一种适合现场使用的低成本肌肉适应性测量方法。本项目的目的是描述对ST的改进，详细说明测试表现和测量方案，评估测量的评分者间信度和评分者内信度，描绘加速度曲线，并探索日间信度。无论是新手评分者还是经验丰富的评分者都表现出了出色的评分者内信度和评分者间信度。本研究中犬的加速度曲线与普通成年人类短跑运动员相似，表明了肌肉适应性在短距离表现中的作用。最后，一小群犬表现出了适度的日间信度，并提供了初始表现数据，为未来的研究提供参考。ST似乎是一种可靠的犬类肌肉适应性测量方法，可用于评估健康犬的表现，并指导虚弱犬恢复运动或工作。
