Journal of Animal Health and Behavioural Science

End-of-Life Care and the Animal

Abstract

Annie Daniel*

As veterinary palliative care evolves over the next decade, I hope to see a strong emphasis on the individual patient maintained. So far, the nascent field has focused primarily on the bereaved family and the burnt-out and compassion-fatigued veterinary team. I've attended professional conferences where the content was heavily weighted toward dealing with depressed families, memorialising deceased animals, performing euthanasia, and teaching veterinarians and nurse’s self-care skills, with few to no lectures on how to identify behavioural signs of distress or better understand the emotional lives of animal patients. The literature on pet loss and bereavement is many times larger and more robust than the literature on assessing quality of life.