Animals Being Prescribed Anti-depressants

[Leelaa17]

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/more-news...2-1226030268790

MENTAL illness in pets is on the rise, with an increasing number of animals being prescribed anti-depressant medications.

Dr Gabrielle Carter, from the University of Melbourne's Faculty of Veterinary Science, said she was seeing more animals with anxiety, depression and phobias.

"We're diagnosing more animals with mental illness," Dr Carter said.

"The main mental distress would be some sort of anxiety. That probably underlies about 95 per cent of the problems.

"There's also many animals with separation anxiety, phobias and aggression."

Dr Carter, a leading animal psychiatrist, said animals were being put on anti-depressant medication in increasing numbers as vets and owners became more aware of the signs of mental illness.

"We use a lot of drugs like Prozac and other anti-depressants and Valium," Dr Carter said. "And we always prescribe behavioural treatment plans."

Year-old Luna is one of Dr Carter's success stories.

At just four months old, the labrador cross began displaying signs of severe mental illness.

Owner Lydia Spicer said: "I was appalled and in tears when my four-month-old puppy turned vicious before my eyes.

"I'd take her for a walk and if someone came past, she'd start going nuts and lunge and growl at them.

"I had no idea I had to keep an eye out for mental illness in a pet. I kept thinking, what have I done?"

Dr Carter said Luna showed signs of fear-aggression, caused by a major anxiety disorder.

"We worked out a treatment plan for her that involves treatment with Prozac and behaviour modification therapy," Dr Carter said. "She's got quite a severe mental disorder, but she's coping well and making huge progress."

Not only dogs can develop mental disorders. Dr Carter said she had treated cats, horses and even birds.

"I've seen lots of compulsive disorders in horses and the way we manage them is important," she said.

"Birds being kept as pets quite often display signs of mental illness.

"The most common sign for birds with mental illness is plucking out their feathers. There are lots of reasons a bird might pull its feathers out, but anxiety can be a cause for it.

"We need to be more aware of the needs of animals and realise their needs are not always being met by our busy lifestyles."

I'm not too sure how I feel about this one.......... I thought there were other ways to tackle their behaviour without using medication?

Edited March 30, 2011 by Leelaa17

[poodlefan]

At just four months old, the labrador cross began displaying signs of severe mental illness.

Owner Lydia Spicer said: "I was appalled and in tears when my four-month-old puppy turned vicious before my eyes.

"I'd take her for a walk and if someone came past, she'd start going nuts and lunge and growl at them.

"I had no idea I had to keep an eye out for mental illness in a pet. I kept thinking, what have I done?"

Oh good idea, blame it all on "mental illness". Once again, society provides an "out" that avoid taking responsiblity for behaviour.

I hope to hell that pup got more help than a tablet once a day.

Medication is no substitute for owner education and dog training.

Edited March 30, 2011 by poodlefan

[Leelaa17]

At just four months old, the labrador cross began displaying signs of severe mental illness.

Owner Lydia Spicer said: "I was appalled and in tears when my four-month-old puppy turned vicious before my eyes.

"I'd take her for a walk and if someone came past, she'd start going nuts and lunge and growl at them.

"I had no idea I had to keep an eye out for mental illness in a pet. I kept thinking, what have I done?"

I hope to hell that pup got more help than a tablet once a day.

Medication is no substitute for owner education and dog training.

Once again I agree. When my GSD was a pup he cried every single night for three weeks and we tried everything - ignoring him, hot water bottle, clock etc and nothing worked - I went to the vet and asked what they thought - they gave me sedatives and I used them for a little while and then as soon as we put him outside he stopped crying - just like that. I wasn't entirely comfortable using sedatives but the vet said just to not use them for very long.

My second puppy also had the same issue except we didnt use sedatives we just dealt with it. they're both fine now and don't cry although my little one still has some issues - and I am currently organising with K9 Pro to get some help for her.

I would never ever consider putting her on anti-anxiety medication (because thats exaclty what she has - severe anxiety - she is the most active dog I have ever come into contact with) as I think there are easier ways to deal with problems that might occur.

And as always, prevention is better than cure.

[Erny]

The increasing occurrence of drug prescription to dogs for behavioural issues has not escaped my notice either.

Edited March 31, 2011 by Erny

[Aidan3]

I would never ever consider putting her on anti-anxiety medication (because thats exaclty what she has - severe anxiety - she is the most active dog I have ever come into contact with) as I think there are easier ways to deal with problems that might occur.

If a dog is severely anxious or is exhibiting stereotypies (OCD-like pacing, licking, clinically diagnosed separation anxiety etc) then anxiolytics can be very helpful. We need to be careful not to rule out appropriate medical care for this sort of problem, as the risk of side-effects vs the benefit gained is very low. The research does support the use of anxiolytics in clinical settings, whether they are being prescribed appropriately by vets is another matter though.

[fuzzy82]

errrr, my puppy did that too, he went stupid on walks and lunged and barked at everything that moved. Nothing a bit of desensitising couldn't fix, I just armed myself with yummy treats and tried to keep him below threshold.

[Nekhbet]

Christ almighty ...

do I really want to comment ... yeah OK I will ...

We truely are getting dumber. Vets diagnosing behavioural disorders? Christ 90% of them can't even give basic training advice. Yay lets start medicating dogs to the eyeballs because owners insist on buying dogs not suitable, or not training them appropriately! Oh yay! We can all be doped up together! Because it's too hard to just put your foot down and go to a training school like everyone used to and train the dog, or hell get it from breeders who you go VISIT like you did in the old days.

You can see a lot of anything when you look hard enough. I say Dr Carter send all her 'troubled' patients down to our dog school for a few visits, if we can't fix it between us she can start pill popping. We have no issues with doing this but prong collars are illegal

Locking my doors now. I should hand over a couple of my dogs and see what problems they imagine considering Melbourne Uni vets consider wrenching my dogs legs out perpendicularly and hearing her scream the official way of diagnosing arthritis, then just doping her upon tramadol and NSAIDS the way to fix it.

[Dogsfevr]

We run boarding kennels & we get dogs in by the truck load on meds for quite frankly appalling reasons.

Labs because there to over the top

The classic which was in the paper by one of the head AVA vets whose own dog was on meds as it was so birdy ,that tends to happen when you buy a working line gundog & it sits in the backyard so its doped to be calm

We can tell when clients ring which vets they are seeing (not specialists) due to those that hand them out like loillies & as a point of interest most are in the wealthy area

[bianca.a]

I have a 15 year old cat (inside only for the last 3 years) and she has always been freaked out by any change within the house. I tried so many different things including a feliway diffuser but nope she still will pee in inappropriate places when stressed. She has had so many tests/scans and the diagnosis has been anxiety. I was told to try her on Alprazolam, I only gave her 1 tablet before I flagged it. She was stoned. Now I have some homeopathic stuff and that works a treat

I know this is a cat but in the original article posted it said pets

[aussielover]

I generally do not believe in medicating animals for mild behavioural problems. I would not choose to medicate my own dog for a mild behavioural problem that could be fixed by a behaviour modification program and with the help of a good trainer/behaviourist.

We are seeing an increasing number of clients requesting medication for so called "behaviour" issues, which generally tend to be hyperactive, understimulated young dogs. We would always recommend a behaviourist over medications, but some clients are not prepared to, or not capable of implementing a behaviour modification program. In these cases, I would rather prescribe drugs than have the dog dumped or surrendered or even PTS as a young, hyperactive dog (often problem barkers, destructive etc) is not likely to find a new home easily

However in some cases of extreme fear aggression or anxiety, I think medication can help put the animal into a better state of mind to gain the most benefit from a behaviour program.

[poodlefan]

We are seeing an increasing number of clients requesting medication for so called "behaviour" issues, which generally tend to be hyperactive, understimulated young dogs. We would always recommend a behaviourist over medications,

I hope you recommend exercise and training too!

[Aidan3]

I was told to try her on Alprazolam, I only gave her 1 tablet before I flagged it. She was stoned.

I'm not surprised. It was an interesting choice of medication for the problem you describe.

[Staranais]

We are seeing an increasing number of clients requesting medication for so called "behaviour" issues, which generally tend to be hyperactive, understimulated young dogs. We would always recommend a behaviourist over medications,

I hope you recommend exercise and training too!

Exercise is a good recommendation. But it's pretty hard to teach someone how to train a dog when you only have a 10 or 15 minute consult with them, and just telling them "train the dog" isn't any use if they have no idea where to start.

That's why it's better to have a good training club or behaviourist in the area that you can refer them to. A client doesn't want to pay a veterinarian's hourly fee to learn about training, not when there are cheaper and better qualified people that they can to go to.

The challenge is finding a local trainer/behaviourist that you trust enough to stake your own reputation on when you refer clients to them, and trust to refer the problem back to you if they decide they think it does need medication.

Edited March 31, 2011 by Staranais

[dancinbcs]

I would never have really believed that dogs suffered mental illnesses like humans until I saw a friend's bitch go through post natal depression after a caesar and further complications. Most bizarre thing I have ever seen. The dog was so severely depressed that I hardly recognised her. The owner was very doubtful about the vet prescribing Prozac, but it worked wonders and she was back to to old self after a few months treatment and never had any further problems.

I have seen dogs depressed for a while after losing an owner or a doggy housemate, but never anything like the level of depression this bitch suffered from.

So while I think too many dogs are prescribed drugs as a quick fix, where training/behaviour management would have worked, there are rare cases that do require medication.

[bianca.a]

I was told to try her on Alprazolam, I only gave her 1 tablet before I flagged it. She was stoned.

I'm not surprised. It was an interesting choice of medication for the problem you describe.

It is used for anxiety, well that's what I am prescribed it for

I just managed her now, if I know for example that my stepson will be coming to stay, I start her on the homeopathic drops. She really is quite odd.

[Aidan3]

I was told to try her on Alprazolam, I only gave her 1 tablet before I flagged it. She was stoned.

I'm not surprised. It was an interesting choice of medication for the problem you describe.

It is used for anxiety, well that's what I am prescribed it for

Yes, I think that might be part of the problem actually. "See a symptom, prescribe a medication that says it treats that symptom". Whether your vet was right in prescribing it or not is not for me to say, it might have been totally appropriate, but not the right dose for your individual cat.

Alprazolam is short-acting, so it's useful for short episodes of anxiety, in response to known stressful events (so in this regard it might have been appropriate, say, if the change in your house was only a few hours). If the anxiety is longer-term, there are other medications which have longer lasting effects without the ups and downs. For spraying in the house a completely different class of medication is often prescribed.

Also, the dosage window is very large. It's likely your cat got way too much of the drug. The idea is to return the animal to as close to "normal" behaviour as possible, not knock 'em out of the park.

Glad the homeopathic drops are helping. This is not so much a critique of your situation but a comment on why a medication might be prescribed inappropriately. It's a far more complex topic than reflected here, though.