Plain-English summary
Cats hide discomfort well, and joint disease in cats rarely looks like limping. What owners tend to notice instead is small and hard to articulate: a cat that takes the stairs in two stages, or stops landing on the windowsill it used to reach in one jump.
It is easy to dismiss that as ageing, and easy for an owner to feel they have nothing concrete to report. A 2023 study tested whether those vague impressions actually correspond to anything measurable — and found that they do.
Cats whose owners had noticed early mobility changes scored significantly worse on a validated pain index and on hands-on orthopaedic examination than cats whose owners had noticed nothing, despite the two groups being similar in age, breed, sex, temperament and body condition.
What the study found
Fifty-seven cats were allocated to a case group (30 cats, with early owner-reported signs of impaired mobility) and a control group (27 cats, without). The study was blinded and nested, with owners completing an inclusion questionnaire and two pre-visit questionnaires — the Feline Musculoskeletal Pain Index and VetMetrica — before their cats were visited at home.
At the home visit each cat had an orthopaedic examination, an assessment of body condition score and temperament, and an accelerometer placed on its collar for two weeks.
The groups did not differ significantly in age category, breed, sex, temperament or body condition score.
Case cats scored significantly lower on the Feline Musculoskeletal Pain Index (P = 0.003) and on the VetMetrica Comfort domain (P = 0.002). The Vitality and Emotional Wellbeing domains were not counted as significant.
The examination findings were the clearest. Total pain scores were higher in case cats (P <0.0001), as were crepitus (P = 0.002) and joint thickening (P = 0.003). Bilateral disease was significantly more likely in case cats (P = 0.005), with an odds ratio of 14, and the number of bilaterally affected joints was higher (P = 0.001).
The authors conclude that both the Feline Musculoskeletal Pain Index and orthopaedic examination were able to distinguish cats with early owner-reported mobility signs from healthy cats, and that recognising mobility impairment earlier would allow interventions aimed at slowing progression.
What this study cannot tell you
Fifty-seven cats is a small study. The design is strong — blinding and a matched control group matter a great deal — but the numbers mean effect sizes should be read cautiously. An odds ratio of 14 from a sample this size carries wide uncertainty.
Owner recruitment also depended on owners who had already noticed something and were willing to enrol in a study involving a home visit and two weeks of accelerometer wear. These are engaged owners, and the finding that their observations were informative may not transfer to owners who are not paying that kind of attention.
The direction of inference runs from observation to examination, not the other way. This study cannot tell you what proportion of cats with joint disease have owners who notice — only that when these owners did notice, examination found more.
Two of the quality-of-life domains, Vitality and Emotional Wellbeing, were reported as not significant despite nominal P values that look low. The abstract does not state the significance threshold used, so the most likely explanation — correction for multiple comparisons — is an inference rather than something the paper spells out.
What pet owners should track
Cats give you a narrow window: they are inactive much of the day, and the moments worth watching are brief. What helps is recording specifics rather than impressions:
- Jumping — whether your cat still reaches the places it used to, and whether it now goes in stages or picks lower routes
- Stairs, and whether the pace or the pattern has changed
- Grooming, especially patches that have become unkempt or areas your cat seems to avoid reaching
- Litter box entry and exit, and whether a high-sided box has become harder
- Sleeping spots — a cat that stops using a favourite high perch has told you something
- Interaction: withdrawal and reduced tolerance of handling are worth noting, since discomfort often shows as changed behaviour before anything looks wrong
A short video of the cat approaching a jump it used to make easily is more useful than any description.
What PAWai can help organize
The value of these observations lies almost entirely in when they started and how they have changed — the two things memory loses first. PAWai holds them dated and in your own words. PAWai does not assess mobility, does not score pain, and does not diagnose joint disease. The measurements that mattered in this study were a validated pain index and a hands-on orthopaedic examination, both of which belong to your veterinarian. What PAWai contributes is that your observation arrives as a dated record rather than as "I think he's slowed down a bit" — which, as this study shows, was worth taking seriously all along.
Disclaimer
PAWai organizes information and educates pet owners. PAWai does not diagnose conditions or recommend treatment. Always consult a licensed veterinarian for medical decisions about your pet.
Citation
Maniaki, E., Murrell, J., Langley-Hobbs, S. J., & Blackwell, E. J. (2023). Do owner-reported changes in mobility reflect measures of activity, pain and degenerative joint disease in cats? Journal of Feline Medicine and Surgery, 25(6). https://doi.org/10.1177/1098612X231178765