Atlas Rehabilitation for Canines

Jan 25th, 2022

Incredibly professional medical provider. Physical Therapist Karen Atlas provided a much more comprehensive evaluation and understanding of the orthopedic condition of our Labrador Retriever than was given by a UC Davis rehabilitation veterinarian. Surprisingly, our dog showed improvement after her first visit and was discharged after six weeks of biweekly intervention, much improved. We have continued some underwater treadmill visits after being discharged, despite the four hour round trip, to try to continue her improvement. Not inexpensive, but extremely effective. I am a physician who has always been impressed with the competency of human PTs. Fortunately, canines can now benefit from their expertise.
Aug 19th, 2020

Karen and her team healed our dog Leos limp 100% and more than a year later it hasnt returned. Our little jack Russell mix is back to zooming around like a little crazy boy. Multiple veterinarians failed to even properly diagnose him. He was misdiagnosed with a fracture in his paw and the leg was splinted. I think if this first error had not occurred, the injury would likely have healed on its own in matter of weeks. But his leg atrophied after weeks in the splint. Another vet and a radiologist confirmed he didnt have any fracture at all. But they just told us to keep resting it. It continued to not improve. The vets spent very little time really figuring out what was wrong! Finally a third vet at St Francis recommended Karen Atlas. Karen Atlas took the time to thoroughly examine him and discovered that his issue was not his paw but his neck and shoulder! For the first time in months I had hope that he was gonna get better. Ive had physical therapy myself and let me say that my dog got way better PT than I ever got! This place looks like its for professional athletes. Within a matter of weeks Leo was back to 100% and Ive never needed to bring him back since. If your dog is hurting, bring him here!
Aug 13th, 2019

Karen and her team are angels. They are so knowledgeable, kind and compassionate as well as having a new state of the art facility. They have helped our dog Blue soooo much. Don't know what I would do without them.
Apr 13th, 2018

I have been bringing dogs to Karen Atlas for going on seven years, and have spent a lot of time watching her work on them as well as on many other animals. What I've learned is that a talented animal rehabilitation therapist can do things for an ailing or injured animal that no other animal professional can do. And Karen is as talented as they come. My own dogs have mostly just needed rehab after orthopedic surgery, nothing fancy, but still unheard of 15 years ago. Because of Karen's expertise and skill, the post-op dogs I have brought to her have recovered more quickly, and been able to return to full activity much sooner, than was the case before she started offering her services. That's been a godsend. My old cattle dog Bindi was able to get back to the beach a month sooner after her TPLO because of good physical therapy -- and that's a month she really needed, as an old girl! I've also seen Karen work wonders on seriously disabled dogs. The most remarkable was a quadriplegic yellow lab who could do little more than lift his head when he was first brought to her. Karen and her staff worked diligently and lovingly with him for months, until he was able to go home ambulatory -- one leg never worked quite right, but he could WALK. It was truly a miracle. If you have ever had physical therapy for an injury or after surgery, you know that physical therapists have a unique skill set for helping with healing and return to function. Karen is a certified physical therapist in California, with hundreds of hours in specialized canine rehab training; she's come to be considered an expert, and offers seminars to veterinarians and physical therapists to help them improve their animal rehab skills. We could not be more fortunate to have her and the dedicated people in her office here in Santa Barbara!
Mar 21st, 2018