Belly Bands?

Anyone here tried using Belly Bands? It's kind of a 'nappy' for the male dogs who have marking or incontinence issues:


We're still having problems with Mambo's peeing when we're not home - he's getting better but very slowly, any small change in the routine means back to square one so we thought we need to try something else... I've read quite a lot of articles about this problem recently and found a lot of possible solutions to support the usual house training we're still doing, and this is one of them.
I don't know whether it's going to work, but I did order one of those belly bands to try - they're not that expensive so I think it's worth to try.
I bought one from this shop http://www.nappypantsfordogs.com/dog-incontinence-belly-bands-9-c.asp

The only thing I worry about is that Mambo will find a way to take it off... of course another 'worry' is how stupid he'll look wearing the thing but he will only wear it when he's alone so hopefully it won't be that embarrassing to him

Never heard of them but than I've only had girlies

How old is Mambo?

I personally wouldn't use one for a pup.

Mambo's probably about 2,5 years old, he hasn't been house trained before we got him from the shelter
he now gets the idea that his toilet is outside, but he still hasn't learn to hold when he stays at home alone. it's not separation anxiety, it's more of the marking thing, as well as not understanding that he can actually hold it for a while longer.

I think these bands are not made for puppies anyway, they're for the adult male dogs

spuker1 wrote:I think these bands are not made for puppies anyway, they're for the adult male dogs

It says on the site that they're good for houstraining - I doubt it, though.

Mambo will probably benefit from it (so will your carpets!) as long as he can't get to it to pull it off. The only problem I can see is that it won't 'hold' a full wee! In which case he'll have a wet & smelly band around his stomach for a couple of hours, maybe.

Never heard of them. Is mambo castrated? Silly question but is he given the opportunity to toilet before you go out? Also it might be worth crating him when you are out, this may help in that he won't want to urinate where he sleeps. Do you shut him anywhere when you are out, or does he have free run of the house? If he has free run it might be worth confining him to one area, such as the kitchen or crating him. Not really much help as I have never had this problem myself sorry! Hope something works for you soon though!

Caryll wrote:

spuker1 wrote:I think these bands are not made for puppies anyway, they're for the adult male dogs

It says on the site that they're good for houstraining - I doubt it, though.

Mambo will probably benefit from it (so will your carpets!) as long as he can't get to it to pull it off. The only problem I can see is that it won't 'hold' a full wee! In which case he'll have a wet & smelly band around his stomach for a couple of hours, maybe.

Just checked them out, that's my thoughts exactly. Also they don't look to be that waterproof either. My kids used reusable nappies and the material on them was different, they also had to wear an outer cover to hold the wee in. This band doesn't seem to have anything like that. It all seems to be soft materials which won't prevent wee leaking out of it, and depending on how long he is left and how many wee's he is likely to do. I would be worried about urine scalding. Also not sure they are a good idea, as they allow him to wee when he wants. This won't solve the problem in the long run, so think it would only be good short term to prevent him ruining furniture or carpets etc. Don't know what to suggest though, sorry!

I cannot see how this is supposed to work. Dealing with the result of the problem is not the answer. You need to carry on working on the house training and as Karen says restrict his movements when he is left inside. You dont say how long you leave him for.

Ty wrote:I cannot see how this is supposed to work. Dealing with the result of the problem is not the answer. You need to carry on working on the house training and as Karen says restrict his movements when he is left inside. You dont say how long you leave him for.

of course we carry on with the training but meanwhile he has his bad days and our carpet is getting worse.
he's restricted to the kitchen/living room only. we leave him for no longer than 4 hours at a time.
we'd rather to avoid crating him, which is why we want to try this first. not as a way to solve the problem, but to support the house training process.
answering your question about how they work - you're supposed to put the 'panty liner' or something similar in it - you can either buy the special doggy ones or use normal female panty liners.

Caryll wrote:Mambo will probably benefit from it (so will your carpets!) as long as he can't get to it to pull it off. The only problem I can see is that it won't 'hold' a full wee! In which case he'll have a wet & smelly band around his stomach for a couple of hours, maybe.

if he wees, it's not usually that much - sometimes he will use a puppy pad and this can absorb everything with no problem. I agree that there is a chance he may just pull it off... I also don't like the possibility of him wearing the wet stuff on his belly - as I say, we will try and see, if that's what's going to happen then of course belly band won't be an option!

Scubasteve wrote:Never heard of them. Is mambo castrated? Silly question but is he given the opportunity to toilet before you go out? Also it might be worth crating him when you are out, this may help in that he won't want to urinate where he sleeps. Do you shut him anywhere when you are out, or does he have free run of the house? If he has free run it might be worth confining him to one area, such as the kitchen or crating him. Not really much help as I have never had this problem myself sorry! Hope something works for you soon though!

yes Mambo's castrated. He always goes out just before we leave home. But recently he also drinks much more because he's back on dry food (prescription) diet to deal with his digestion problems. I guess it's one of the reasons why we came back to square one with his house training - for a while he was doing very well before changing his diet, now he started weeing again...

I know you say you don't want to crate him but could you limit him to just the kitchen so accidents can be wiped up when you return? This will save your carpets no end. You could, depending on how long you are out for, pull his water up a little while before and carry on making sure he wees before you go out. This should help empty him but would only work if you aren't out for a really long time!

Asked if he was castrated incase he was scent marking his territory, but this shouldn't be the case if he is.

we've actually bought a crate anyway and are now waiting for the delivery... i want to try everything that's possible to house train him completely.
unfortunately i can't limit him to the kitchen only because we have living room and kitchen together as we live in a flat - he can't be in our sleeping bedroom, and he's only allowed to be in the other bedroom when we're with him so kitchen - living room is the only option

we always make sure he wees before we go out, but he still has accidents, recently it got worse, he weed today too i think i will limit the water in the morning so that he won't be thirsty but won't drink so much - he drinks MUCH more now he's eating dry food

in regards to the castration and marking, i'm not sure if it stopped marking completely because when we go for a long walk, he wees at the beginning without putting his leg up, and then as we walk along he marks every 5-10 minutes, even if it's just a few drops. so i guess he still got the need to do it.

I think the best option is to crate train him, its a new thing that the UK has not got fully used to as the norm but most other country,s see this as part of training.
I read a good book by Cesar Millan how to raise the perfect dog and it gave me great info before i got Beau. I was unsure about crate training but it was the best thing i done for sure.

dont just use it for sleeping, put the dog in if he needs to calm down, or has been naughty and as soon as his tail stops waging and he has calmed down let him out, he will soon start using it all the time to sleep





hope this helps

yes it definitely helps, thanks!
I'm reading about the crate training as well, we'll see how Mambo (and us!) will get on! meanwhile we will try the belly band as well.
hopefully if we put enough effort and will be patient we will get the results. Mambo is very clever and can learn very quickly so I believe it's all worth trying and we'll see the results soon

Not trying to scare you but frequent urination and frequent or excessive drinking may be early signs of canine diabetes especially if he has lost weight and is lethargic/tired(less energetic than normal) of late. May be a good thing to have his blood sugar levels looked at to rule this out.

Ty wrote:Not trying to scare you but frequent urination and frequent or excessive drinking may be early signs of canine diabetes especially if he has lost weight and is lethargic/tired(less energetic than normal) of late. May be a good thing to have his blood sugar levels looked at to rule this out.

I think that was looked into when he started to lose weight recently?

Caryll wrote:

Ty wrote:Not trying to scare you but frequent urination and frequent or excessive drinking may be early signs of canine diabetes especially if he has lost weight and is lethargic/tired(less energetic than normal) of late. May be a good thing to have his blood sugar levels looked at to rule this out.

I think that was looked into when he started to lose weight recently?

now when I think about it, I'm not sure if they did the tests to rule the diabetes out - he was examined by the vet because of the weight loss issues twice already, and he had his blood tests done and they turned out to confirm that it is the digestion issue (his small intestine is not working properly). I don't remember the diabetes was mentioned, maybe at the beginning, but the symptoms, according to the vet, were more likely to be linked with the poor digestive system.

he was on raw diet before, so I guess the amount of water he drank back then was smaller - now he's on dry it increased and I can definitely see the difference, but I guess he's still drinking normal amounts for a dog eating kibble, it just changed because his diet changed.
and since he's on prescription diet he stopped loosing weight, he's actually gained about 1,5 kg already so I guess it doesn't look like he may have diabetes?

spuker1 wrote:now when I think about it, I'm not sure if they did the tests to rule the diabetes out - he was examined by the vet because of the weight loss issues twice already, and he had his blood tests done and they turned out to confirm that it is the digestion issue (his small intestine is not working properly). I don't remember the diabetes was mentioned, maybe at the beginning, but the symptoms, according to the vet, were more likely to be linked with the poor digestive system.

he was on raw diet before, so I guess the amount of water he drank back then was smaller - now he's on dry it increased and I can definitely see the difference, but I guess he's still drinking normal amounts for a dog eating kibble, it just changed because his diet changed.
and since he's on prescription diet he stopped loosing weight, he's actually gained about 1,5 kg already so I guess it doesn't look like he may have diabetes?

If blood tests were done, they would almost certainly have been for diabetes as well as anything else that showed up. It's a standard for unexplained weight loss.

thanks Caryll.
and I guess I'm quite right saying that dogs on kibble drink more than dogs who eat raw?

I would think so. Raw meat has some moisture content anyway.

The same simple blood sugar test used for humans is used. A small drop of blood onto a paper and into the little machine. I have know idea if these things have a proper name even though my grand daughter is a diabetic.

well, I believe the vet did all the blood tests that were needed to be done and that they ruled out any other possibilities before making the diagnose.

moreover, he only started to drink more water since we changed his diet so that is obviously linked to the food

the belly band arrived today (very fast!) - we will try it over the weekend while we're at home and I will let you know how we're getting on.
crate should also arrive soon, so hopefully with a bit of patience and time we will manage to improve mambo's wee holding skills

FYI, I used a belly band with Monte for a while after I got him as he was trying to mark in the house (over a year old who was housetrained but likes to mark- a lot!). I don't think it would work for housetraining (as it is more of a need than a desire), but Monte didn't like his belly getting wet and he stopped right away and mine is now up in a closet and probably will be thrown out at some point. Hope it works for you as well!