Pets on the Couch: Neurotic Dogs, Compulsive Cats, Anxious Birds and the New Science of Animal Psychiatry

According to veterinarian and author Dodman (The Dog Who Loved Too Much; The Cat Who Cried for Help), the No. 1 cause of pet death is "bad behavior" such as incontinence, destructiveness driven by anxiety, etc. The reason: an outmoded, outdated view of animals and their actions. The author focuses on brain similarities between human and animals and asks if medicines that help people deal with stress and depression could also assist animals. Calling his approach One Medicine, Dodman has successfully treated dogs and cats as well as pigs and horses. One of the most interesting conditions he tackles here is obsessive-compulsive disorder, looking at Doberman Pinschers with the ailment that he says the breed is particularly prone to because of a genetic anomaly on chromosome 34. He further aids a horse suffering from cribbing, where the animal is so stressed it literally chews its stall apart, using a morphine antagonist that blocks the effects of endorphins. Through careful research, he explores how animals experience "human" problems, debunking the antiquated theory that these creatures are automatons with no feelings.