Table 7.

Musculoskeletal health evaluation

Assessment tool		Healthy	Not healthy
Query owner*	Pain	Absence of pain	Signs of pain
	Perception of the ability to perform normal daily activities	Able to perform normal daily activities, including jumping, although these may be performed less often, and the height and frequency of jumping may be decreased	Difficulty in performing normal daily activities, such as elimination, jumping and/or moving around the environment
	Ease of movement	Moves easily	Awkward or stilted movement
	Quality of life	Excellent quality of life	Compromised quality of life
	Use of analgesics	None, or nutritional supplements only	Occasional or frequent use of pharmaceutical compounds for pain relief
Observe mobility	Combined limb, muscle and neurologic function	Moves fluidly; slow movement acceptable	Stilted, non-fluid movement
Perform physical examination, and orthopedic examination of muscle mass and joints	Joints	No pain on moderate manipulation (flexion, extension and torsion) of joints. (Crepitus, effusion or thickening may be present, or evidence of DJD may be seen radiographically but is not associated with any pain)	Pain on moderate manipulation (flexion, extension and torsion) of joints (with or without crepitus, effusion or thickening, or radiographic evidence of DJD)
	Muscle mass	Normal, or age-appropriate symmetrical decreases in muscle mass over spine, scapulae, skull, wings of the ilia, triceps and thigh muscles. The spine of the scapula, shaft of the humerus and shaft of the femur, wings of the ilium and transverse processes of the lumbar vertebrae should not be readily palpable, although they may be more prominent than in younger animals. No asymmetry of muscle mass loss	Excessive decreases in muscle mass over the spine, scapulae, skull, wings of the ilia, triceps and thigh muscles. Asymmetrical loss of muscle mass
	Somatosensory function	No excessive sensitivity on palpation of body structures or on gentle handling of, or touching, the skin	Excessive sensitivity, demonstrated as skin twitching, muscle fasciculations, withdrawal from gentle touch and/or aggressive response to gentle touch

^*Use the available tools^23–25 and also the feline musculoskeletal pain index at https://cvm.ncsu.edu/research/labs/clinical-sciences/comparative-pain-research/clinical-metrology-instruments/

DJD = degenerative joint disease