A video shared online authentically showed an injured stray dog walking into a veterinarian’s clinic and receiving treatment.
The incident recorded by a security camera took place in 2021. Though Snopes was unable to contact the veterinarian involved for direct confirmation of the video’s authenticity, all available evidence supports the video being real.
Since 2021, people on social media periodically post a video they claim shows a homeless dog walking into a veterinary clinic and showing people its wounded paw. According to one Reddit post (archived) from June 2026, the dog was “hoping someone would help, and they did.”
Instagram posts of the video from April (archived) and January (archived) 2026 had received tens of thousands of likes. The video also was widely shared on Facebook (archived) in 2025 and on Reddit (archived) in 2021.
All currently available evidence supports that the video is real, although Snopes was unable to contact the veterinarian who took care of the dog and therefore unable to directly confirm its authenticity with her. Due to the strength of the available evidence, we’ve rated this claim true.
It’s worth noting that the version of the video in the June 2026 post was flipped horizontally. The other videos don’t match the direction it’s flipped in, and the letters and numbers visible at the corners of the video posted in June 2026 are backward.
Timeline
On March 8, 2021, Amomeupet, a Brazilian news site focused on pets, linked to the source video, which was uploaded to Instagram on March 6. Amomeupet wrote that the dog’s hurt paw was an ingrown toenail on its pad, which had already been treated by the time the article was published. However, the dog remained in the clinic’s care a while longer because it needed to undergo chemotherapy for a transmissible venereal tumor. The first chemotherapy session was scheduled for March 8.
Amomeupet reported that the veterinary clinic was Vet VIP in Juazeiro do Norte, a town in the Brazilian province of Ceará. While Amomeupet did not name the veterinarian responsible for treating the dog, March 9 reporting from g1, a Brazilian news portal, and Diário do Nordeste, a newspaper associated with Brazil’s National Association of Newspapers, said the veterinarian’s name was Dayse Silva.
Both of those articles also confirmed that the footage was recorded March 6 and the clinic was located in Juazeiro do Norte. Diário do Nordeste further pinpointed the clinic’s location as being along the road Avenida Ailton Gomes.
A Google Maps search for Vet VIP in Juazeiro do Norte led to a veterinary clinic with that name along the road named above. A June 2022 Google Street View image of the clinic showed signage on the building with Silva’s name. A May 2019 Google Street View image showed the clinic using a different name, but still owned by Silva.
Some of the visible details of the clinic from the video of the dog align it with the Vet VIP location on Google Maps. The June 2022 Street View was the only one in which Silva’s clinic also owned the small shop next door, which it used as an entrance at that time. In May 2023, the shop is back to just its original building, and its entrance is again a sliding door made of the same blue-hued glass as the rest of the clinic’s facade.
In the video of the dog walking into the clinic, there is what appears to be a dog bowl just outside the shop, although it’s difficult to see because of the colored glass and the chairs inside the building. This dog bowl is perhaps easiest to see in the version of the video uploaded by Amomeupet. In an October 2020 photo uploaded to the Google Maps location for Vet VIP by its owner, that same dog bowl outside of the shop is pictured.
The source video linked by Amomeupet appeared on an Instagram account, presumably the clinic’s, with the handle @clinicavetvip. That account appears to no longer exist, but there were a total of four attempts to archive it on March 13 and 15, 2021, according to the Internet Archive’s records.
Snopes tried and failed to contact Silva through her personal Instagram to confirm the authenticity of the video and story alike.
After the initial reporting on the video and the dog starring in it, various news stories continued to give updates on the dog. This includes a March 10 update from Diário do Nordeste, a March 11 update from g1, a March 15 article from BBC Brasil and a Sept. 10, 2021, update from Amomeupet.
The articles shared photos of Silva with the dog in the video, as well as update videos on the dog’s well-being. The clinic received donations covering the cost of the dog’s treatment and beyond. He was eventually named Quindim. After Quindim’s successful chemotherapy treatment, he was adopted by someone who owned other dogs.
Silva told reporters that the outdoor security cameras showed the dog was sleeping outside when he noticed the activity at the clinic, limping inside and presenting her with his paw. According to a translation of a g1 article, Silva said the dog “may have entered the clinic by sniffing out the presence of other animals that were being treated there.”