Sleeping Respiratory Rate (SRR)

Assessing Cardiorespritaory Health Through Sleeping Respiratory Rate (SRR). To monitor your pet’s disease progression, we ask owners of animals with cardiac disease to monitor Sleeping Respiratory Rate (SRR). This is a simple tool method you can use at home as an indicator of developing pulmonary oedema or pleural effusion in dogs and cats.

Why monitor Sleeping Respiratory Rate (SRR)?

Assessing and recording the Sleeping Respiratory Rate (SRR) is an invaluable home-monitoring technique for pet owners and is one of the best indicators of changes in your pet’s heart health.
To measure SRR accurately follow the below steps

• Find a quiet, comfortable, thermo-neutral area (usually your home in front of the TV)
• Let your pet fall asleep (note: don’t include breaths taken when your pet is dreaming – twitching or vocalising)
• Start a timer for 60 seconds
• Watch your pet’s chest – it will rise and fall each time they take a breath
• Record the number of breaths taken in the 60-second timer. This process should be repeated 2-3 times per day initially to establish a baseline. Later this can be reduced to once or twice weekly.

If your pets SRR is above 25BPM call the clinic immediately on (03) 5221 5333.
If there’s a significant change in SRR between measurements, resume daily recordings to confirm the change or observe any trends. There are a couple of apps available to assist you with monitoring and recording your pet’s SRR – Cardalis© andHeart2Heart© are two reliable examples.