# Animal-Assisted Therapy with Cats



## David Baxter PhD (Sep 6, 2018)

*As Animal-Assisted Therapy Thrives, Enter the Cats*
By Jennifer Kingson, _New York Times_
September 6, 2018

*More research is done on the therapeutic benefits of dogs than on cats and other animals. But there are signs of change.* 

In  her first bout with breast cancer, Kate Benjamin got by with a  lumpectomy and radiation. The second time was far more grueling: a  14-hour double mastectomy in November, followed by an eight-week course  of chemotherapy that ended in May.

Throughout  it all, she has been surrounded by cats. Ms. Benjamin, 47, is an expert  on feline-friendly interior design, and she keeps eight cats at her  home in Phoenix and two in her nearby work studio. The cats are beloved  pets as well as product-testers for her popular blog and newsletter, Hauspanther, where she showcases products for cats. And, now that she is ill again, they are also serving to help her heal.

“The  cats are just such a great reminder of living in the moment,” Ms.  Benjamin said. “They don’t worry about the past, they don’t worry about  the future, and you have to do that with cancer.”

“Just  having them close by is the best therapy,” Ms. Benjamin added. “If I’m  sitting comfortably in a chair after surgery or I’m lying down just to  feel their warmth and hear them purr, it’s comforting just to have them  going around their regular business — whereas everyone else is texting  and fussing over me.” 

The  use of animals for therapeutic purposes is flourishing. Dogs, miniature  horses, cats, rabbits and even llamas are increasingly being used to  help heal and elate the sick in hospitals, cancer clinics and other  settings, even though research to support the efficacy of  animal-assisted therapy is largely in its early stages.

Demand  for therapy animals in clinics and workplaces — and even college  campuses at exam time — sometimes outstrips supply, according to Pet  Partners, the nation’s largest registry of therapy animals. The  organization, based in Bellevue, Wash., has a database of 13,000 animals  that make a collective three million visits a year. While 94 percent of  the animals are dogs, the roster includes 200 cats and 20 llamas, said  C. Annie Peters, the group’s president and chief executive.

“I  will say it takes a very special cat” to become a therapy animal, Ms.  Peters said. “There are regular grooming and hygiene requirements, and  they have to enjoy getting in a car.”

Therapy  animals are not the same as service animals, which are trained to  assist people with disabilities. And while a house cat can comfort its  owner, it would need to have a high tolerance for strangers and hugs to  become a registered therapy cat. 

Some do make the cut, including a cat named Xeli that works at Denver International Airport and one that regularly visits Primary Children’s Hospital in Salt Lake City. 

“When  kids have pets at home, having a therapy animal normalizes their stay  here,” said Jennifer Toomer-Cook, a spokeswoman for the hospital. “They  help with pain management and fear, and they’re a diversion. Having a  purring cat next to you creates calm.” 

Evidence  of the growing enthusiasm for therapy animals is cropping up in health  and academic circles. The American Hospital Association held a webinar in July  on how to set up or improve a hospital animal program. Aetna, the major  health care company, is among the growing number of employers that bring therapy animals into the workplace to reduce stress and lift people’s moods. 

Research  and opinion are starting to coalesce around the benefits of  animal-assisted therapy for people with autism, depression,  post-traumatic stress disorder and other concerns. In a sign of the  growing maturity of the field, Purdue University, in conjunction with  the Human Animal Bond Research Institute, is amassing a library of work on the human/animal bond that now includes some 30,000 articles. 

Still, many experts in the field say there is much more scientific work that needs to be done. 

“People  who practice animal-assisted interventions are so convinced of its  value, its efficacy, that they kind of rush ahead with it and haven’t  really waited for the research to catch up,” said Dr. James A. Serpell,  a professor of ethics and animal welfare at the University of  Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine and director of its Center  for the Interaction of Animals and Society. “That doesn’t mean that the  research won’t catch up.”

But Steven  Feldman, executive director of the Human Animal Research Institute in  Washington, said that the science supporting the health benefits of  therapy animals was well established. “Researchers always call for more  research, that’s what they do,” he said, adding that there was already a  “tremendous amount of money and research and energy flowing into the  area of human-animal interaction.”

The National Institutes of Health started funding research on human-animal interaction in 2008, said Dr. Marguerite E. O’Haire,  assistant professor of human-animal interaction at Purdue University’s  College of Veterinary Medicine. And that, she said, “has really changed  the landscape in this field.”

Many  variables are hard to factor into a scientific study on animal-assisted  therapy, like whether a patient fears or dislikes animals and whether  the animal in question is familiar with the patient. Anthrozoologists,  scientists who examine relationships between animals and people, say  that a loyal pet will have a different effect than a therapy dog or  random dog on the street. 

Studies in this field are also “hard to randomize,” said Dr. O’Haire, whose own research   has looked at the potential benefits of classroom guinea pigs for  children with autism. Scientists who are testing a drug, for example,  can easily give some participants a look-alike placebo. But what is the  equivalent in a trial that pairs patients with therapy dogs?

Dr. O’Haire noted that far more research is done on dogs than on cats  and other animals. But there are signs of change. In March, for  example, a team led by scientists at the School of Veterinary Medicine  at the University of California-Davis published a study in the journal Frontiers in Veterinary Science  about interactions between family house cats and children with autism.  While the study had a number of caveats — it pointed out, for example,  that people who had “positive relationships with their cats” were  probably more likely to participate — it found that cats in families  with a child with autism-spectrum disorder “often provided valuable  bonding, attention and calming affect to the child.”

It  has been well proven, Dr. Serpell said, that human relationships and  social interactions are extremely good for someone’s health, boosting  the immune system and cardiovascular functions. “The question that then  arises is, can animals fulfill this kind of social support function?” he  said. “And we’re beginning to find evidence that maybe they can, and in  some cases, maybe they’re better than humans.”

And  that, Dr. Serpell said, is “where it gets really interesting, because  we don’t know what these animals are doing that seems to have such a big  impact.” Already, he said, people are starting to recommend dogs for veterans with PTSD,  because the patients are “in a permanent state of high alert and  chronic stress, and having these dogs around really does seem to calm  them down, make them feel less anxious all the time.”

The  hormone oxytocin plays a key role in the way animals can soothe humans,  Dr. Serpell said. “The petting and the physical contact side of things  is critical in terms of oxytocin release,” he said. “Physical contact  with something warm and fuzzy and soft is also a good trigger.”

Ms. Benjamin, whose feline style business I profiled in The Times in 2013,  said that the desire for physical contact may work in both directions.  “Since I started chemo, it seems that my gray tabby Andy needs to be  touching me almost constantly,” she wrote to me in April, about halfway  through her treatment. She has been writing a second blog, FelineSoFine, to chronicle her cancer journey. 

In  August, Ms. Benjamin said she was feeling much better, though she still  faces more surgery. Sadly, her favorite cat, Ando, the one who would  sit on her pillow and put his paw on her head, died in June, not long  after she finished chemo. “I just miss him so much,” she said by phone.  “I feel like, in some sort of ‘woo-woo’ way, he was there for me through  this, and then he was like, ‘O.K., you’re good, I’ve got to go.’”


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