LOOBANI Lift Harness Honest Review: Where It Helps and Where It Falls Short

The LOOBANI lift harness did not fix my dog, and I want to be straight with you about that before anything else. Maple is a twelve year old yellow Labrador mix, seventy four pounds, with arthritis in both hips and the left elbow as of this February. A sling is not a treatment. It is a handle. What a handle can do is keep a heavy dog off the floor and keep your own back from going out while you give her the help she needs.

I bought the LOOBANI sling in the second week of June, five months ago now, on Amazon, with my own money. Nobody sent me one to try. For the few days before it arrived I used a rolled bath towel under her belly, which works about as well as a bath towel sounds like it works. The sling is a padded band that goes under the belly with a handle on each side, and it lets me take a share of her rear weight while she carries the rest. Rear end only. It is not a full body harness and it does not pretend to be one.

What a Rear Sling Actually Does

The idea is simpler than the name suggests. You fold the padded section under the dog's belly, just forward of the hind legs, bring the two ends up over her back, and snug them down. The listing calls the closure a drawstring and that matches what my hands do: I pull, I snug, and it stays where I set it. The body is nylon with a soft lining on the inside face, and there is a thickening to the sling so the band does not press a hard edge into a sore belly.

Here is the part I wish more people understood before they order. A sling does not carry a dog. It shares the load. When Maple and I go up the three wooden steps at my back door, she still has to push off with her back legs, and on a good day she does most of that while I take maybe a quarter of her weight. On a bad morning I take more. If your dog cannot stand at all, or cannot put any weight on the rear, this is not the tool that gets her up again, and that is a conversation for your veterinarian.

I will also say that five months of daily use has not changed my mind about the design. It is a plain piece of equipment. Nylon, padding, a handle on each side, a storage bag. There is nothing clever on it and nothing much to break, and at this stage of Maple's life I am not looking for clever. I am looking for something I can grab in the dark at five in the morning without thinking about it.

It is also not a walking harness. I know people use slings to steady a dog on the short trip out to the yard, and I have done that myself, but my hands are on the handles the whole time. It is not something you clip a leash to and take around the block. It is a lift aid, and five months in I still treat it as one.

How Five Months With It Has Actually Gone

Most mornings the sling stays folded in the bag it came with, hanging on a hook by the back door. Since the ramp went in during the first week of August, the back steps are a ramp job and the sling comes out on the days Maple is stiff, which runs two or three mornings a week and more when the weather turns cold and damp. Before the ramp it went on four to six times a day: down the steps to the yard, back up, down again at supper, back up, once more before bed.

The first week was not graceful. Maple did not care for anything sliding under her belly and she sat down the first two times I tried it. So I slowed down. I put it on and took it off a few times a day with a treat in front of her nose and no expectation that she would go anywhere, and by the end of that week she stood still for it. Now she leans into the sling before I have it all the way up, which I take as her vote.

Where it earns its keep is the standing up. On a stiff morning she will be down on the carpet in the bedroom and she cannot get her back end underneath her in one push. I slide the sling under, take the handles, and give her just enough that she can finish the job herself. That is the whole trick. Not lifting her. Taking enough of the weight that she can do the rest.

One thing I noticed over the summer: the sling does not make her stronger and it does not make her less stiff. It gets her from lying down to standing without a fight. On the mornings when she is really sore, it is the difference between her going out to the yard and her staying on the carpet all day, and a dog who stays on the carpet all day goes downhill quickly. That is the honest case for keeping it by the door.

The other place it matters is the car. Before we had a ramp, my husband Walt and I lifted her into the back of the Outback between us, him at the shoulders and me at the hips with this sling. If you have ever lifted seventy four pounds of unhelpful dog into a hatchback, you know why I am describing that as a two person job.

The Sizing Is Where People Get It Wrong

I ordered the X-Large. Maple is seventy four pounds and it fits her across the belly with room to spare, which tells me these sizes run generous. Do not order off weight alone if you can help it. Get a cloth tape and measure around the widest part of her middle, the way the listing shows, and order from that number. I measured twice because I am the kind of woman who measures twice.

Too loose is the worse mistake. A sling that is too big slides forward toward the ribs, and then you are holding up the middle of the dog instead of the back half, which does nothing for the hips and puts a strange pull on her spine. Too tight is a different problem: you are pressing a band into a sore belly, and she will tell you about it by refusing to walk. Mine sits snug and flat, and I can still slide two fingers under the front edge.

If your measurement lands between two sizes, I am not the person to make that call for you. Write to the seller with the number, read the reviews from people whose dogs are built like yours, and pick the one you can send back. I got it right the first time and I know that is partly luck, not my measuring.

Five months, a wash every other week, and the stitching where the handles meet the body looks the same as the day it came out of the bag.

Where It Genuinely Helps

Standing up from the floor is the first one, and it is the reason I would buy it again. A big dog going down on a slick floor and having to be coaxed back up is the thing that wears a person out, and this gives me a way to help without hauling on her collar or pulling her front legs.

The back steps are the second. Three wooden steps, nothing dramatic, and before the sling she would stand at the top and think about it for a long moment. With the sling she goes down without the pause. I also use it on the hardwood in the hall and the kitchen when the floor is cold under her feet and she is reluctant, though that is more steadying than lifting.

Third, the vet's office. Tile floors everywhere. I am not going to pretend it turns a difficult trip into a pleasant one, but it means I can get her from the car to the exam room without a scene, and Dr. Amari has said more than once that Maple comes in calmer when I am not wrestling her through the door.

Fourth, and this surprised me, it helps me as much as her. I am sixty five and I have my own aches. Lifting a seventy four pound dog with a towel under the belly is a fine way to hurt your back, and I would just as soon not test that. The handles let me lift with my legs and keep my shoulders where they belong.

Where It Falls Short

Let me be clear about the biggest one. This is a rear sling and nothing more. Maple's front end is holding up so far, but if your dog's shoulders or front legs are the problem, this will not help you and you will be annoyed with it. It also does nothing for a dog who cannot bear weight at all. When I have asked about that, the answer is a full body lift harness or a cart, and a vet who knows your dog.

Second, it takes two hands and a bend. I live with my husband so I have help, but if you are on your own and your own back is not what it was, getting a stubborn dog into a sling is a chore. On a bad morning she does not want to be messed with and I have to be patient about it. Any honest review of this thing should say that out loud.

Third, it shifts. Maple swings her hips a little when she walks, and the sling creeps sideways and needs recentering every few steps on a longer trip. It is not a defect exactly. It is what a band under a moving dog does. If you want something that stays put and lets you steer her, that is a different piece of equipment and worth looking at on its own terms.

There is one more limit worth naming, and it is not the sling's fault. A sling is only as good as the dog's willingness to be handled. Some dogs hate having something put under them and no amount of treats changes that. Maple came around in a week. A neighbor of mine had a dog who never did, and she went another route. Only you know which kind of dog you have at home.

Washing, Storing, and the Small Annoyances

The care instructions say machine wash, and I have washed the LOOBANI every other week since June. It comes out of the machine looking like it went in. The nylon has not frayed, the lining has not pilled, and the drawstring still snugs. I let it air dry over the back of a kitchen chair rather than putting it through the dryer, which is my habit with anything that has to keep its shape.

It folds down small enough to go back in the bag it came with, and that bag lives on a hook by the back door next to the leash. The small annoyance is that it takes a minute to get on properly, so on a quick trip out I sometimes skip it and just go slow down the steps with a hand on her flank. A thing you have to put on is a thing you will sometimes skip. That is worth knowing before you buy it.

Who This Is For

This is for the owner of a big dog whose back half has gotten unreliable while the front half still works. A dog who can stand with help, who can still push off if you take some weight, who is slow on the steps or slow getting up off the floor. It suits a two person household, or one stubborn person with a strong back, and it suits someone who wants a tool that does one job properly. It is also a sensible first purchase before you spend on a ramp or a cart, because it tells you quickly how much help your dog actually needs.

Who Should Skip It

Skip it if the weakness is in the front legs or the neck. Skip it if your dog cannot bear weight on the rear at all, because a sling asks her to do her share and she cannot. Skip it if your dog panics at anything touching her belly, unless you are willing to spend a week with treats and short sessions the way I did. And skip it if what you really need is traction. Maple's slip on the hall floor in April was a floor problem, not a lifting problem, and no sling fixes a slick floor. That took a different answer entirely.