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Writer's pictureEmergency Vet Online

How do you know it's time?

When your pet is suffering, euthanasia is a gift. But how do you know when the right time to say goodbye is? If you do it too soon, you may miss valuable time together. If you do it too late, you may put your pet through unnecessary suffering. 


Here’s what I recommend. Instead of trying to find the “perfect” time, you should make the best decision that you can from a loving place.


For some guidance, you can have an open and honest discussion with your veterinarian about your pet’s health and quality of life. 

Here are some questions you can ask yourself and your veterinarian:

  • Is it possible for my pet to recover with a treatment plan that I can commit to both financially and personally?

  • Does my pet have a good quality of life? Are they eating and drinking? Are they able to urinate/defecate? Do they enjoy human interaction?

  • Does my pet have more good days than bad?

If you answer no to one or more of these questions, it may be time to talk about euthanasia with your veterinarian.

The Quality of Life Scale

To make the process easier on pet parents and to reduce the feelings of guilt and confusion, veterinary oncologist Dr. Alice Villalobos created an HHHHHMM Quality of Life scale. HHHHHMM includes:

  • Hurt

  • Hunger

  • Hydration

  • Hygiene

  • Happiness

  • Mobility

  • More good days than bad

Each factor is scored from 1 to 10 to help you evaluate your pet’s quality of life. You can go over these criteria with your veterinarian to make an informed decision about what’s best for your pet. Dr. Villalobos introduced the Quality of Life scale for dogs, the Quality of Life scale for cats, and the concept of Pawspice to the veterinary field to help provide palliative care to terminally ill pets.



As your dog ages and their health declines, it can be difficult to figure out when it's the right time to put your dog down.

The Quality of Life Scale allows you to evaluate your dog’s well-being to help you make difficult end-of-life care decisions. The scale gives you tangible ways to measure your pet’s appetite, mobility, energy and pain levels, and overall well-being.

You can take this form to your vet to help you assign a score to each area. This will give you a more objective picture of your pet’s quality of life.

Use this Quality of Life Scale to evaluate your dog every day and mark your pup’s score on a calendar to keep track of their good and bad days. Then your vet can help you decide what type of care your pet needs or if it’s best for your pet to let them go.

End-of-life decisions are excruciatingly difficult, but the Quality of Life Scale can help you work with your veterinarian to make sure you are making the best decision for your dog.


Below is the infographic Quality of Life Scale, you can follow the link and print it out.



Disclaimer: The information provided in this blog is written and provided by PetMD and is not that of Emergency Vet Online.

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