Pheromones and 25 years of pheromonotherapy: what are they and how do they work?

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 116-122
Author(s):  
Claire Hargrave

The capacity of animals to communicate via pheromones is long established and, for generations, pheromones have been unwittingly used by man to manage the behaviour of animals in agriculture — using the chemicals produced by an individual member of a species to alter the behaviour of another member of that species. More recently, insect pheromones have been used in managing insect infestations of crops. However, approximately 25 years ago the French veterinary surgeon, Patrick Pageat, began to investigate the production of pheromones in both farm and companion animals and how synthetic analogues of pheromones could be used to improve animal welfare, creating a new field in veterinary medicine — pheromonotherapy. This article aims to summarise the main developments in pheromonotherapy over the last 25 years.

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (9) ◽  
pp. 396-401
Author(s):  
Tamzin Furtado

Helping animal owners to recognise and manage obesity in their animals is a particularly complex area of communications in veterinary medicine. Several studies have outlined the difficulty veterinary professionals face in such discussions, including frustration with the client, embarrassment (particularly if the owner is also overweight), and a sense of inevitable failure. However, obesity continues to be a serious and prevalent welfare problem in dogs, cats, and probably other companion animals as well — hence those discussions will only continue. This review considers veterinary surgeon–client interactions around obesity from the perspective of behaviour change psychology and motivational interviewing, in order to determine how veterinary surgeons and nurses can best assist owners. We consider how an approach based on a supportive and empathetic conversational style could be best suited to these discussions, leading to tailored weight management solutions. Nurses are ideally placed to work with owners in this way.


Animals ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 199 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tomislav Mikuš ◽  
Mario Ostović ◽  
Ivana Sabolek ◽  
Kristina Matković ◽  
Željko Pavičić ◽  
...  

This survey was the first one investigating opinions of veterinary students in Croatia towards companion animals and their welfare, with special reference to dogs and cats as the most popular companion animals in the European Union. The study included students of all six years of the integrated undergraduate and graduate veterinary medicine study programme in Croatia. First-year students were surveyed twice, before and after having attended the course on animal welfare. Student opinions were assessed on the basis of their mean responses to five-point Likert scale questions and frequency of responses to Yes/No/I do not know questions and ratio scale questions. Study results revealed students to have strongly positive opinions towards companion animals and their welfare. The majority of student statements did not differ significantly between the first and sixth study years or before and after having attended the animal welfare course in the first study year, mostly yielding a straight, non-fluctuating line. Students were not sure whether welfare of companion dogs and cats was compromised. Study results pointed to reliable and reasonable opinions of veterinary medicine students in Croatia towards companion animals and their welfare, as well as to the welfare issues these species may be facing nowadays.


Author(s):  
Leslie Irvine

American animal shelters house between six and eight million dogs and cats each year. The question of what to do with millions of healthy but unwanted animals has animated sheltering from the start. Responses reveal how the presence of animals in society shapes institutions, laws, and policies. Pounds emerged to resolve the problems posed by stray animals. Concern for animal welfare created the need and justification for shelters, as humane alternatives to the pounds. Trends in pet-keeping and veterinary medicine shaped twentieth-century sheltering practices, as shelter populations evolved from strays to unwanted pets. Recently, criticism of high euthanasia rates engendered no-kill shelters. The social and cultural significance of animal sheltering lies in the light it sheds on the changing value of companion animals.


2014 ◽  
Vol 22 (6) ◽  
pp. 580-601 ◽  
Author(s):  
Serdar Izmirli ◽  
Ali Yigit ◽  
Clive Julian Christie Phillips

We examined attitudes toward nonhuman animal welfare and rights and career aspirations in Australian and Turkish veterinary students. A representative university was selected in each country, with 190 first- and third-year students sampled in each. Survey questions addressed attitudes toward nonhuman animal welfare/rights, and intended career. Australian and Turkish students were predominately female and male, respectively, but attitudes were similar between sexes. Australian students rated keeping companion animals and hormonal desexing more acceptable, and food and rest deprivation, pain during slaughter, and using animals in experiments less acceptable than Turkish students. Keeping companion animals related strongly with students’ moral values, their decision to study veterinary medicine, and program satisfaction. More Australian than Turkish students wanted to enter clinical practice. Thus veterinary students of these two culturally contrasting countries demonstrated both differences and universalities, such as companion animal keeping, which influenced their attitudes toward animals and career aspirations.


Author(s):  
Emily Shoesmith ◽  
Luciana Santos de Assis ◽  
Lion Shahab ◽  
Elena Ratschen ◽  
Paul Toner ◽  
...  

Background: Companion animals may be a positive presence for their owners during the Covid-19 pandemic. However, the welfare of a companion animal is strongly influenced by the behaviour of their owners, as well as their physical and social environment. We aimed to investigate the reported changes in companion animal welfare and behaviour and to examine the association between these changes and companion animal owners’ mental health. Methods: A cross-sectional online survey of UK residents over 18 years of age was conducted between April and June 2020 (n = 5926). The questionnaire included validated, bespoke items measuring outcomes related to mental health, human-animal bonds and reported changes in animal welfare and behaviour. The final item of the survey invited open-ended free-text responses, allowing participants to describe experiences associated with human-animal relationships during the first UK lockdown phase. Results: Animal owners made up 89.8% of the sample (n = 5323), of whom 67.3% reported changes in their animal’s welfare and behaviour during the first lockdown phase (n = 3583). These reported changes were reduced to a positive (0–7) and negative (0–5) welfare scale, following principal component analysis (PCA) of 17 items. Participants reported more positive changes for cats, whereas more negative changes were reported for dogs. Thematic analysis identified three main themes relating to the positive and negative impact on companion animals of the Covid-19 pandemic. Generalised linear models indicated that companion animal owners with poorer mental health scores pre-lockdown reported fewer negative changes in animal welfare and behaviour. However, companion animal owners with poorer mental health scores since lockdown reported more changes, both positive and negative, in animal welfare and behaviour. Conclusion: Our findings extend previous insights into perceived welfare and behaviour changes on a very limited range of species to a wider a range of companion animals. Owner mental health status has a clear, albeit small, effect on companion animal welfare and behaviour.


Author(s):  
Avi Ohry

Theodore James Faithfull (1885- 1973), the grandfather of the singer Mariann Faithfull, was a veterinary surgeon who became a psychotherapist and sexologist. His remarkable personal story, is an important part of the history persons who envisioned modern sociology. This article brings a "meeting point " between history of medicine, medicine, sociology, psychology, sexology and veterinary medicine. The names of Sir Patrick Geddes FRSE (1854 –1932) , Dr. Theodore James Faithfull (1885- 1973), his son, Robert Glynn Faithfull (1912- 1998), and Victor Branford ( 1863 –1930), are listed among those who envisioned modern sociology.


Author(s):  
Angus Nurse ◽  
Tanya Wyatt

This chapter examines the notion of wildlife as property or ‘things’ and critically analyses the extent to which anthropocentric notions of wildlife as a resource for human exploitation determines harm caused to non-human animals. This chapter examines how anthropocentric notions of morality and human-centred values underpin the exploitation of non-human animals and the sense in which they are owned. Employing a green criminological perspective, the chapter examines the use and abuse of wildlife within the animal ‘entertainment’ industry. The chapter examines the use of wildlife within aquariums, zoos, and circuses and examines both the legality of this use and the non-human animal harm contained within such uses. Evidence exists, for example, of psychological harm caused to wildlife in zoos that would likely be unlawful if experienced by companion animals. Yet, zoos and safari parks are ostensibly legal operations, thus animal welfare legislation is often the only mechanism through which action can be taken in respect of what would otherwise be deemed unlawful captivity (see also Chapter 7 on animal rights). We end the chapter by touching on how wildlife come to be property – that is a short discussion of wildlife trade, including the online market.


2019 ◽  
Vol 24 (9) ◽  
pp. 480-487 ◽  
Author(s):  
Neus Elias ◽  
Ana-Maria Rotariu ◽  
Tobias Grave

Traumatic brain injury is common in companion animals and can occur from many different types of trauma such as road traffic accidents or bites. Following the primary injury, which is beyond control of the clinician, secondary injury occurs minutes to days following the trauma. The secondary injury will lead to neuronal death, and is the focus of treatment strategies for the emergency veterinary surgeon. Treatment of traumatic brain injury includes nursing strategies, intravenous fluid therapy, hyperosmolar therapy and diuretics, pain management, maintenance of oxygenation and ventilation, temperature regulation, anticonvulsant therapy and glycaemic control. All of these are discussed in this clinical review.


Animals ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (9) ◽  
pp. 150 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chiara Mariti ◽  
Federica Pirrone ◽  
Mariangela Albertini ◽  
Angelo Gazzano ◽  
Silvana Diverio

We investigated the attitudes of veterinary students towards animals and their welfare in Italy. Regression analyses revealed predictors that are significant in differentiating students’ scoring tendency based on their gender, familiarity, and intention to work with a specific animal species, type of diet, and membership in an animal rights association. Female students, who were mostly familiar with pets and aspired to work with species other than livestock, following an animal-free diet and being a member of an animal rights association, had a significantly greater odds of having a high Animal Attitude Scale score (AAS), i.e., very positive attitude towards animals, versus a less positive attitude. Conversely, the familiarity with livestock and preference for working with livestock significantly increased the odds of a low AAS. Overall, students considered all of the Brambell Report’s Five Freedoms important for animal welfare protection. However, students scored higher for companion animals than for livestock, particularly regarding the freedom to express normal behaviour and the absence of fear and distress. This study suggests that veterinary students place less importance on the psychological aspects of welfare for livestock, and there is a tendency for students who are mostly familiar, or aspire to work, with livestock to have a less positive attitude towards non-human animals and their welfare. These findings should be considered within the veterinary educational curriculum due to their potential impact on animal welfare.


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