have saved several dogs’ lives. I know this because their veterinarians told the dogs’ owners that I did and the owners called or came in to thank me. I have been the recipient of several tearful, grateful hugs during an in-person visit, often accompanied by flowers, a gift or a meal bought for my staff as a thank you presented with, “You saved my dog’s life!”

I tell them I am happy we could help, but this is our job—caring for their dogs. More than anything else, the service we owe our customers is to safely and correctly groom their dog, while also catching any potential health or safety issues that might need attention.

So how do we accomplish this demonstrably life-saving feat? We simply use our eyes and hands to visually and manually inspect every inch of every dog that comes into the shop for grooming. With most dogs, we see nothing that needs reporting and we are happy to tell the customer so. Usually what we do find and report is not a matter of life or death but something minor such as a badly broken toenail, or sometimes a rash that turns out to be a yeast infection. Anything out of the ordinary that doesn’t look or feel normal or healthy should be reported to the customer either during or after the visit, depending on severity.

Obviously some of the dogs we see, such as our more senior clients, have the same issues every visit; typically soreness in a joint, toenails that are growing faster than they are being cut, etc. It’s still important to report these observations, but it can be done in a more casual manner. For example, “Fifi is still having a hard time standing on the table, so we are laying her down for her grooming as much as possible.”

The best time to catch any kind of problem is during blow-drying. Whether you use high-velocity dryers, stand dryers or gentle hand-held dryers, you should never just cage-dry a dog completely. Drying time should be used to visually inspect every inch of every dog or cat you groom, looking between toes, in armpits, under ears, on the bottom of tails and in the insides of legs. We have caught foxtails embedded in the skin between toes that merely looked like a weird, tiny hole that, when squeezed, produced a little pus. In the worst case scenarios, an embedded foxtail can make it to vital organs, including the lungs, spinal cord or brain, heart and abdominal organs, causing symptoms specific to that organ.¹

One wonderful, attentive and caring groomer working with me some years ago was styling a doodle’s bearded face. She was carefully trimming around mouth hairs, clearing up hairs sticking in the teeth, etc. While the dog’s mouth was open, she saw what looked like a very small piece of cauliflower in the back of the mouth. When she asked for help to take a second look, sure enough, it wasn’t a piece of food, it was a white lumpy growth at the back of the dog’s mouth.

We reported it to the owner and the loving family took her to the veterinarian immediately. Sadly, it was confirmed to be mouth cancer, but we caught it early. She went through treatment and, while years later it eventually came back and ultimately led to her passing at age 13, she lived years that she would not have otherwise. All because our eyes were on every inch of that dog and we reported something that was out of the ordinary.

Since veterinarians typically see healthy dogs perhaps once a year and owners don’t usually examine their dogs closely on a regular basis, we groomers are often the first line of defense for our clients. We should touch every area of a dog’s body in a gentle, loving way, feeling for lumps, tender spots, scratches, mats, foreign objects (one time we found a fishing hook inside a mat on a doodle!) and anything else out of the ordinary. Record details of what is normal for the dog in your notes about each client.

Very early in my shop’s first year, I groomed a very sweet nine-year-old shepherd mix. I was just running my hands over her and one of her rear leg thigh muscles felt noticeably thicker than the other. Nothing else seemed to be wrong and she wasn’t touchy. It was my first time grooming her so I did not even know what was normal for her. However, since it was not typical, I reported it to the owner.

One day, about three weeks later, I had a line of people checking out at the front desk, and this shepherd mix’s owner came into the shop and waited patiently in line to come to the counter to speak to me. When she got to the counter, she announced loudly enough for the others waiting in the lobby to hear her, very emotionally, “I just wanted to come in and tell you thank you for saving my dog’s life!”

She had taken her dog to the vet after my report and the thicker leg was found to have cancer in it. I hadn’t even reported a lump, just one leg thicker than the other. I almost didn’t even say anything, but the veterinarian said that if it had been caught any later, she would have either lost the leg or died. Instead, they were able to treat it and she lived another five years using all four legs. When she finally passed away at almost 15 years old, the owner came in again to tell me tearfully of her passing and thanked me for the extra years she got with her. She also posted this story online for all the world to see in my reviews, which brought in more new customers.

It is important to remember that we are groomers, not veterinarians, so we cannot practice veterinary medicine (i.e., diagnose or treat) without a license. We can only describe symptoms or behaviors out of the ordinary that we observe. We are not to name what we think it is and we should not engage in speculation with the owner. If a customer asks what it could be, we cannot even guess, because no matter how much experience we have had, we are not medical professionals.

We cannot say, “Your dog might have cancer,” or “Your dog has an ear infection.” Instead we can say, “There is a lump in his abdomen I have never noticed before,” or “Your dog was unusually sensitive to me touching her ears today.”

Send people to their veterinarians. The veterinarians in your area will come to know the caliber of pet groomer that you are, positioning you as a very important ally in the health of the pets in your community, and will thank you for your excellent customer service and dedication to the health of your clients. And it goes without saying that your clients will be forever grateful to you for looking out for the wellbeing of their pets, because you may have saved their life.