Signs Your Dog Might Be Going Deaf
The inability to hear commands is often the first red flag that pet parents notice when their dog has hearing problems. It’s often the high-pitched sounds that hearing-impaired dogs fail to respond to at first. So, if your dog used to come running when you whistle, pour kibble into his food bowl, or when someone knocks on the door, and suddenly fails to do so, you should perform certain tests at home to check your dog’s hearing.
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Your Dog Displays New Behavioral Problems
Dog owners may confuse their pet’s hearing issues with behavioral problems. If your well-behaved and easy-to-control dog suddenly stops responding to voice commands, you might think that it’s a form of canine revolt, more so when the behavior occurs together with incontinence in a senior dog. Before being frustrated with your pet’s behaviors, it’s a good idea to do some at-home tests to determine if your canine buddy has trouble hearing.
When dogs develop a hearing problem, they start to rely on their fully functional senses that have gone into overdrive to compensate for partial or permanent hearing loss. When this shift happens, hearing-impaired dogs tend to be easily startled by an unexpected touch or the vibration on the floor made by someone walking nearby. Without their sense of hearing, these stimuli can be pretty scary for a deaf dog that is sleeping. Losing the ability to rely on their sense of hearing can certainly lead to a noticeable increase in a dog’s startle reflex.
Just like people, dogs regulate their vocalization with the aid of their sense of hearing. With hearing problems, a dog won’t know how loud they are barking. Thus, they tend to start barking excessively.
Deafness in Dogs
Many senior dogs suffer from hearing impairment as they age and become less responsive to you and the world around them. Your ability to communicate with your dog becomes hampered when he can’t hear what you have to say, which can be frustrating for you and stressful for your dog. But there are steps you can take to help your senior dog cope with hearing loss.