Quality of life (QoL) assessment scales are a useful tool in traditional companion animal species to help the pet owner evaluate the need for palliative care and humane euthanasia. While some aspects of these scales can be extrapolated to some exotic taxa, there are no standardized species-specific scales for common exotic companion animals.

Masking phenomenon and other important differences in anatomy, physiology, and behaviour makes QoL assessments in these species challenging, and communicating these assessments to pet owners can be difficult. This lecture will review the available tools to exotics practitioners such as pain assessment scales, as well as idiosyncrasies in assessing quality of life for exotic animals.