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Tracking Respitory Rate With Hospet
Tracking your pet’s respiratory rate can provide early clues to discomfort, pain, or worsening medical conditions — especially heart or lung disease. Whether you’re monitoring during rest, recovery, or hospice care, this guide will help you:
- Measure respiratory rates at home
- Know what’s normal vs. concerning
- Choose a tracking method that fits your comfort level
- Record changes over time to support decision-making
🌬 Step 1: Understand What You're Measuring
Your pet's respiratory rate is the number of breaths your pet takes per minute while at rest, ideally asleep. Each rise and fall of the chest counts as one breath.
- Normal for cats and dogs is < 30 breaths per minute.
- Consistently being over this level at rest may be a cause for concern.
Note: These are resting respiratory rates. Excitement, stress, or exertion will temporarily raise them. A value within the reference ranges above can still be abnormal for an individual pet. If you have any concerns, you should contact your primary care veterinarian.
⏱ Step 2: How to Measure Respiratory Rate
- Wait until your pet is resting or sleeping, not panting or recently active.
- Watch the chest rise and fall.
- Count each full breath (in + out = 1) for 30 seconds.
- Multiply by 2 to get the breaths per minute.
Tip: Use a timer or stopwatch on your phone to stay accurate. Hospet's Events feature can help you track and label these readings over time.
🧠 Step 3: Track Consistently, Not Perfectly
Even if you don’t measure every day, consistent tracking — especially at rest — helps you notice trends.
- Is the respiratory rate slowly increasing?
- Are there sudden spikes after activity or meals?
You can track these readings in Hospet using the "Respitory Rate" events, and add Annotations for milestones like medication changes or veterinary visits.
📝 Final Tips
- Take readings at the same time each day, if possible — morning or bedtime works well.
- Make a note if your pet was awake, purring (in cats), or recently active, as these can affect numbers.
- Respiratory rate tends to be the most useful day-to-day measurement for hospice or cardiac monitoring.
When to Seek Veterinary Help
Contact your vet if you observe:
- Rapid, shallow breathing while resting
- Breathing with effort (e.g., open-mouth, head extended)
- Gums that are pale, blue, or gray