Review of Related Literature And Studies

FOREIGN LITERATURE

* Pets and children

A less developed aspect of the dark side of having pets is pet abuse as
an indicator of human violence. Six articles focussed on this topic. In a
review of criminal violence research, Dadds, Turner and McAloon
(2002) report that cruelty to animals in childhood is a strong predictor
of violence towards humans. Wilson and Norris (2003) noted that
cruelty to animals was a ‘red flag’ in the history of many serial killers.

*Wisdom, Saedi and Green (2009) reported that pets provided

empathy and ‘therapy’; connections to social engagement (also
indicated in Krupa & Zimolag, 2009); could serve as substitute ‘family’;
and supported self-efficacy and empowerment. Pedersen et al. (2011)
found that patients with clinical depression responded positively to
working with farm animals. Their levels of depression and anxiety
decreased and sense of competence increased. This improvement was
related to engagement in work tasks with the animals. These findings
are consistent with Krupa and Zimolag’s (2009) occupational science
analysis of how caring for a pet can be rehabilitative, particularly for
people experiencing a mental illness. Pets can assist people to re-
establish structure in everyday life, foster social skills and sociability;
and develop confidence, self-worth and a sense of competence.
Perhaps most powerfully, homeless young people interviewed by Rew
(2000) identified their pets preventing them from choosing suicide.
*Managing Pet Owners’ Guilt and Grief in Veterinary Euthanasia
Encounters
Patricia Morris

Through examining the emotion-laden encounters between

veterinarians and bereaved pet owners, this study focuses attention on
a group of medical professionals who manage the emotions of their
clients in light of opposing contextual goals. While negotiating possible
outcomes for animal patients, veterinary emotion work is designed to
assuage guilt and grief to facilitate timely and rational decisions.
However, after clients make the difficult decision to euthanize their pet,
veterinary emotion work is geared toward creating “safe” emotional
space for grieving clients. This study illustrates that veterinarians have a
growing commitment to comforting the owners of euthanized animals
and to validating their feelings of grief, pain, and sorrow. On a broader,
theoretical level, this study also applies and extends concepts
developed in previous sociological analyses of emotion management
and human–animal relationships.

*Social Science Information, vol. 57, 3: pp. 403-421.

People commonly interact with terrestrial domestic animals, such as

dogs and cats, horses, cattle and goats, and birds. Thereby individuals
of different species form animal–human bonds. We are now forming
relationships with ocean animals in increasingly common ways through
growing human populations, advances in technology such as SCUBA,
ocean mapping, underwater instrumentation and advances in aquatic
animal husbandry. Octopuses and humans share quite distant
evolutionary ties and yet share aspects of sensory ability and
intelligence. Octopuses thereby pose interesting challenges and
conundrums for understanding animal–human relationships. I consider
several reasons to expect that the evolution of octopuses, and of
animal cognition generally among active and visually sophisticated
animals, will favour traits that support relationships between
individuals. The evolutionary outcome of animals capable of forming
inter-individual relationships may thus be expected in any evolving
biota with organisms of this kind. This article explores the ability of
ocean and terrestrial animals to relate to one another in ways that are
reciprocal, if not equally balanced, and illustrates this with the
examples of octopuses. 

*OMEGA - Journal of Death and Dying, vol. 75, 2: pp. 124-150.

Human–animal relationships are increasingly incorporated into families

as a normal part of family life. Despite this, relationships with animals
are often viewed as inferior to human relationships. This becomes
problematic during times of loss and grief when members of a grieving
companion animal owner's support system do not understand the
salience of the relationship with the animal. Veterinary and other
helping professionals need basic information about the experience of
companion animal loss in order to help support and normalize the
experiences of grieving companion animal owners. The present study
qualitatively describes human–animal relationships and the subsequent
loss and coping experienced by owners of beloved companion animals.
Comparison with human and other types of loss and factors unique to
companion animal loss are discussed, and practical applications for
veterinary and other helping professionals are provided.

Review of related Studies

Foreign Literature

*Dog Bite Risk and Prevention: The Role of Breed

Maulings by dogs can cause terrible injuries47 and death—and it is

natural for those dealing with the victims to seek to address the
immediate causes. However as Duffy et al (2008) wrote of their survey
based data: "The substantial within-breed variation…suggests that it is
inappropriate to make predictions about a given dog's propensity for
aggressive behavior based solely on its breed." While breed is a factor,
the impact of other factors relating to the individual animal (such as
training method, sex and neutering status), the target (e.g. owner
versus stranger), and the context in which the dog is kept (e.g. urban
versus rural) prevent breed from having significant predictive value in
its own right. Also the nature of a breed has been shown to vary across
time, geographically, and according to breed subtypes such as those
raised for conformation showing versus field trials.

*Dairy Cattle
Assessment of Animal Welfare Issues in the dairy industry has been
succintly addressed (Arave and Albright 1997). Issues and concerns
include the potential for reduced quality and quantity of individual
attention in large dairy herds; dehorning of calves; prolonged
stanchion-tying of cows; tail docking; separation of cow and calf; and
raising calves in hutches rather than in groups. Improved management
practices have been adopted in both confinement and grazing dairy
herds, regardless of size, to enhance the quality of cow care. These
practices include managed rotational grazing to maintain consistent
availablity of high quality pasture for grazing herds, close attention to
cow comfortandfacility design for confinement herds, and improved
milking practices and dairy herdhealth management for all dairy herds.

*Swine
Common practices in the swine industry include ear notching and
tagging, teeth clipping, tail docking, and castration. Most procedures
are performed shortly after birth when pain is considered to be
minimal. Stressed pigs show signs of immunosuppression, behavioral
changes, and greater disease incidence. Stress factors can differ
between intensive and extensive swine systems. In both systems, good
management and understanding of animal well-being concerns are
critical. A positive relationship with sows that are at ease with their
human handler and the number of pigs raised/sow annualy has been
detected (Holden and McGlone 1997).

*ANIMAL HANDLING
During the decade of the 1990’s livestock handling practices have been
much improved, although the handling of “downer” and crippled non-
ambulatory animals still needs some attention (Grandin 1997;Grandin
1990a;Grandin 1990b). The leadership of Temple Grandin has had a
profound impact on the ways animals are handled and how facilities
are designed to improve animal well-being throughout the US livestock
industry.

*Markets and Stockyards

Grandin (Grandin 1997) strongly suggested that downed non-
ambulatory livestock at markets should be immediately euthanized, or
transported to a local, convenient slaughter facility. It was noted that
many markets now have a ‘no downer’ policy. Some markets and
slaughter plants do not allow ‘downers’ to be unloaded. In order to
prevent crippled or weak ‘downer’ livestock from being shipped for
many miles, it was proposed they be sent to a local slaughter plant near
to the farm or euthanized on the farm. A number of livestock groups
such as the National Pork Producers have adopted ‘no downer’ policies.
Continued improvements should include proactive team efforts
between the farm, livestock organizations, livestock markets and
slaughter plants.
LOCAL LITERATURE

*Kathryn Bayne.

In June 2007, in association with the Federation of European Laboratory

Animal Science Associations and the International Council on
Laboratory Animal Science (FELASA/ICLAS) meeting in Como, Italy, ILAR
and the International Association of Colleges of Laboratory Animal
Medicine (IACLAM) invited representatives of laboratory animal
medicine organizations from around the world to meet and initiate a
dialogue about appropriate veterinary care standards for laboratory
animals. Participants included individuals knowledgeable in regulations
and guidelines pertaining to veterinary care of laboratory animals from
organizations such as the American College of Laboratory Animal
Medicine (ACLAM), Canadian Association of Laboratory Animal
Medicine (CALAM/ACMAL), India’s Committee for the Purpose of
Control and Supervision of Experiments on Animals (CPCSEA), European
College of Laboratory Animal Medicine (ECLAM), European Society of
Laboratory Animal Veterinarians (ESLAV), FELASA, Singapore’s National
Advisory Committee on Laboratory Animal Research (NACLAR), and the
United States Department of Agriculture (USDA).

The sources of the various international standards were reviewed

and summarized. These sources include standards established by
government agencies, in the form of legislation, regulations, or policy,
but also guidance derived from professional organizations primarily
composed of laboratory animal veterinarians.

Based on presentations summarizing those guidelines and

regulations, three main themes of interest could be distilled from the
discussions: (1) the qualifications of the veterinarian, (2) the authority
of the veterinarian within the program, and (3) the role of the
veterinarian. Both convergence and diversity of approach to these
three points were described by the participating representatives,
suggesting that harmonization is occurring in some areas of veterinary
care while in others there remain differences, some of which could be
quite significant.

*The United Kingdom’s Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act (Home

Office 1985) stipulates that “the well-being and state of health of such
[laboratory] animals are monitored by a suitably qualified person in
order to prevent pain or avoidable suffering, distress or lasting harm.”
The A(SP)A further requires that “no place shall be specified in a project
license or as a breeding site unless it is so designated by a certificate,
which in turn requires a veterinary surgeon or other suitably qualified
person to provide advice on animal health and welfare.”

*The Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals (NRC 1996)
was the most specific of the guidelines discussed during the roundtable.
The Guide makes it quite clear that “A veterinary care program is the
responsibility of the Attending Veterinarian who is certified or has
training or experience in laboratory animal science and medicine or in
the care of the species being used.” The reference to certification in the
Guide may be met by specialty board examination, for example by
ACLAM, ECLAM, the Japanese College of Laboratory Animal Medicine
(JCLAM), or the Korean College of Laboratory Animal Medicine. It may
also be met by the FELASA Category D (Specialists) certificate of
competence.

*Laboratory Animals, vol. 32, 3: pp. 270-275. , 

First Published Jul 1, 1998.

The antinociceptive actions of morphine incorporated into an injectable

chitosan-based gel were investigated in rats. Subcutaneous
administration of 4.8 mg/kg morphine sulphate in a gel composed of
N,O-carboxymethylchitosan (NOCC) and chitosan resulted in significant
antinociception within 10 min that was maximal at 60 min and
persisted for 6 h. In contrast, the same dose of morphine sulphate
injected in sterile saline produced maximal responses at 30 min but
only persisted for 2 h. NOCC/chitosan gel was easily injectable using a
22 guage needle and appears stable in long-term storage. No local or
systemic adverse effects other than morphine-induced sedation were
observed either at the time of injection or during the subsequent 48 h.
We conclude that gels composed of chitosan and chitosan derivatives
are effective matrices for sustained-release formulations of opioid
analgesics capable of providing long-lasting antinociception.
*Veterinarians' role for pet owners facing pet loss
 P. Gloor P. Fernandez‐Mehler DVM 

Dr. med. vet. 

First published: 25 May 2013

Owners' satisfaction with, and expectations from, their veterinarians

around euthanasia, including questions on disposal of pet remains
subject to animal species, clients' gender, age, family conditions, area
of living and type of veterinary clinic visited were evaluated by
questionnaire. Questionnaires were to be filled out by clients
consecutively visiting the individual practices and hospitals for any kind
of consultations. Of 2350 questionnaires distributed, 2008 were
returned and available for analysis. Owner satisfaction concerning the
procedure of euthanasia was high (92 per cent, 1173/1272). After the
event of euthanasia, 14 per cent (170/1250) had changed their
veterinarian, even though 75 per cent of these 170 had been satisfied
with the procedure. Most owners (88 per cent) expected veterinarians
to talk about their pet's final destination, and 38 per cent expected this
to happen early in the pet's life. For 81 per cent clients, the veterinarian
was the primary informant about the possibilities concerning the
disposal of pet remains, and 33 per cent indicated their veterinarian as
the contact person to talk about pet loss. Area of living, or veterinary
specialisation, only marginally influenced the answers. Veterinarians
play an important role to inform their clients concerning questions
around euthanasia and the care of pet remains, and to support them
during the process of mourning.

*Owner response to companion animal death: development of a

theory and practical implications.
C L Adams, B N Bonnett, and A H Meek

This study used an inductive research method known as grounded

theory to develop a theory to describe owner response to the death of
a pet. Participants were identified from 8 veterinary clinics in
Wellington Country, Ontario. Eighty percent (8 of 10) of the practices
approached agreed to participate and there was a 77% (44 of 57)
participation rate by clients. Nondirective interviews were conducted
with participants approximately 10 days following the death of their
pet, and at 3, 6, and 12 mo thereafter. The theory developed suggests
that people's reactions are best described as a social and psychological
search for meaning. Factors that contributed to the search for meaning
included societal values and norms, the cultural milieu of pet death,
and the cultural milieu of veterinary medicine. Other factors, such as
the participant's personal beliefs, life stage, critical life events, and
animal attributes, either alleviated or aggravated the experience. The
outcome for participants grieving the death of a pet was a self-
governing approach to coping with the death. Practical implications and
suggestions for veterinarians are presented.