RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Mark Holmes — Mon, 04 Nov 2013 10:33:55 GMT

[quote user="Niall Taylor"]

[quote user="Gillian Mostyn"]I've been through childbirth twice...[/quote]

Me too - didn't feel a thing, don't know what you're on about

Niall

[/quote] My wife dug her nails into my hand - really sore!

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Mark Holmes — Mon, 04 Nov 2013 10:33:43 GMT

[quote user="Niall Taylor"]

[quote user="Gillian Mostyn"]I've been through childbirth twice...[/quote]

Me too - didn't feel a thing, don't know what you're on about

Niall

[/quote] My wife dug her nails into my hand - really sore!

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Hannah Wynne Richards — Mon, 04 Nov 2013 10:11:50 GMT

I'm not often a coward about expressing my opinions,but (not having given birth) daring to compare the pain with anything else is one I'd be scared of!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Wynne

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Mark Hedberg — Sun, 03 Nov 2013 23:20:12 GMT

[quote user="Niall Taylor"]

[quote user="Gillian Mostyn"]I've been through childbirth twice...[/quote]

Me too - didn't feel a thing, don't know what you're on about

Niall

[/quote]

The coroner is going to rule this a clear case of suicide when Gillian's done with you, Niall!

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Niall Taylor — Sun, 03 Nov 2013 22:14:01 GMT

[quote user="Gillian Mostyn"]I've been through childbirth twice...[/quote]

Me too - didn't feel a thing, don't know what you're on about

Niall

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Gillian Mostyn — Sat, 02 Nov 2013 23:12:29 GMT

[quote user="Martin Atkinson"]When I broke my arm and dislocated my wrist in a bike crash, I cycled home one handed, had it plated and casted. I refused pain relief because it made me feel nauseous and tired. The cast was restricting me so I took it off and went back to work next day. I drove myself to the hospital the next week for the post-op check, the surgeon asked me how much longer I wanted to be signed off work for I gave him an odd look and told him I hadn't been off work. I went skiing 4 weeks later. The surgeon wrote 'remarkable recovery' on my case notes. This philosophy has been applied to every injury and setback I've ever suffered - harden the **** up and get on with it! [/quote]

I've been through childbirth twice, with no pain relief.

I win!

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Niall Taylor — Tue, 29 Oct 2013 21:46:10 GMT

[quote user="Martin Atkinson"]... a bang of the head is the most painful thing I've ever suffered followed by a badly stubbed toe, fractured little finger, fractured ribs, comminuted tibial fracture, displaced radial fracture in that order... [/quote]

Blimey Martin, you want to take a bit more water with it!

Niall

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Martin Atkinson — Mon, 14 Oct 2013 19:24:14 GMT

[quote user="Anthony Todd"]I'll bet a graphic, gruesome wound with lots of blood and exposed bone is perceived as more painful than a kidney stone?[/quote] From experience not true. In serious injuries a whole load of endorphins and endogenous opiates kick in - fight or flight reaction. I can honestly say that a bang of the head is the most painful thing I've ever suffered followed by a badly stubbed toe, fractured little finger, fractured ribs, comminuted tibial fracture, displaced radial fracture in that order i.e. in inverse order of seriousness. One of my nurses' boyfriend was the hardest man I've ever met and I've never seen anyone is as much pain as when he had a ureteral stone, he cried like a baby and fainted.

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Anthony Todd — Mon, 14 Oct 2013 18:39:23 GMT

[quote user="Richard Carter"] please rate you level of pain you currently feel[/quote]

Yeah, Martin would always reply, "about 0 or 1" and I'd say 45 or more, and mean it!

But actually, and this hasn't yet been mentioned, one does sort of forget pain, whereas, if one has an uncomfortable , mental pain-free incident it's with you for a long time...

Maybe animals "forget" pain and not the gateway or horse-float that they're scared of going through?

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Anthony Todd — Mon, 14 Oct 2013 18:30:21 GMT

[quote user="Martin Atkinson"]When I broke my arm and dislocated my wrist in a bike crash[/quote]

When I dislocated my ankle it hurt like hell, more than a kidney/uretal stone. I promise you, fentanyl is just gorgeous and the penthrane whistle a close second...

Whilst Martin may be a stoic and is obviously very proud of this, we are trying to assess the impact, whether perceived or actual, in our patients; no-one has explained the abused colt and the response to what I imagine is excruciating pain.

I'll bet a graphic, gruesome wound with lots of blood and exposed bone is perceived as more painful than a kidney stone?

Another example would be the use of "elastrator" rings to castrate lambs which seemed to cause hours of distress, sitting down, not grazing etc yet with the knife, very little reaction 2 minutes later.

"Please explain", as an australian politician replied, when asked a question containing a long word

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Richard Carter — Mon, 14 Oct 2013 18:18:43 GMT

Did anyone see the TV program where learned pain was discussed re babies in America where a significant number are circumcised and where the pain reaction was much more advanced in the circumcised group even though done very young. We see the same thing occasionally with puppy vaccs - the pup much more fearful the second time around especially if an id chip done at first vacc, even if minimal reaction, with fussing, treats etc at the time of first injection.

Do think the pre-occupation of pain is encouraged in the UK - seen some hospital surveys where very leading and suggestive questions were put to the patient along the lines of ' did the doctor treat your pain adequately and for long enough' and ' please rate you level of pain you currently feel x weeks after your operation.... Now the chances of getting sympathy/ reward or attention are obviously better if you play up to the questions.

If there is no hospital and no chance of attention eg war zone or car accident, people seem to cope amazingly well, making lucid decisions like cutting arms off to escape for instance and most animals seem to overcome their pain discomfort to escape/ survive/ fight back. Incapacitating pain is not evolutionary advancement.

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Anthony Dennison — Mon, 14 Oct 2013 17:51:41 GMT

[quote user="Martin Atkinson"]This philosophy has been applied to every injury and setback I've ever suffered - harden the **** up and get on with it! [/quote]

I did this with a dodgy hamstring last week - had been feeling tight in training so just stopped doing anything. Then had to play full 80 minutes of rugby on the Saturday, everything fine.

Nociception is a physiological thing - the nerve fibres are activated by inflammatory mediators etc. Pain is purely mental.

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Martin Atkinson — Mon, 14 Oct 2013 17:26:38 GMT

[quote user="Thomas Johnson"]The mother of my boss at my last practice had fairly advanced dementia and was in a nursing home. She fell from a first floor window and broke her arm. She apparently recovered much quicker than expected with far less evidence of pain. My boss put this down to her only being aware of the nociception at that moment, she had no memory of having broken her arm, no fear of how long it would take to heal, whether it would heal, etc.Did she 'suffer' less than someone without dementia breaking their arm?[/quote] When I broke my arm and dislocated my wrist in a bike crash, I cycled home one handed, had it plated and casted. I refused pain relief because it made me feel nauseous and tired. The cast was restricting me so I took it off and went back to work next day. I drove myself to the hospital the next week for the post-op check, the surgeon asked me how much longer I wanted to be signed off work for I gave him an odd look and told him I hadn't been off work. I went skiing 4 weeks later. The surgeon wrote 'remarkable recovery' on my case notes. This philosophy has been applied to every injury and setback I've ever suffered - harden the **** up and get on with it!

Does this mean that I suffer any less or do I just refuse to give into pain and disability. Is this similar to Thomas's boss' mother or an animal with no sense of fate or self-awareness. Does this mean that we sometimes usually read too much into pain and suffering as existential? Answers on a postcard.or just here.

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Thomas Johnson — Mon, 14 Oct 2013 16:02:31 GMT

[quote user="John Flynn"]

Accepting the equation of "pain" with "suffering" (which I don't), this would also, by extension mean that differing groups of humans (babies etc. as mentioned by David Mills earlier) "suffered" to different degrees.

[/quote]

The mother of my boss at my last practice had fairly advanced dementia and was in a nursing home. She fell from a first floor window and broke her arm. She apparently recovered much quicker than expected with far less evidence of pain. My boss put this down to her only being aware of the nociception at that moment, she had no memory of having broken her arm, no fear of how long it would take to heal, whether it would heal, etc.Did she 'suffer' less than someone without dementia breaking their arm?

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Anthony Todd — Mon, 14 Oct 2013 12:33:22 GMT

[quote user="Hannah Wynne Richards"]Your castration method fully justified a prosecution[/quote]

I quite agree, but I promise you in NZ in the 60s it was the new thing and was an "advance" on just plain casting, again with no anaesthetic, either local or general. Bear in mind chloral or chloroform were the only other agents available, or at least in common use.

I never did it, but not because of ethics or humanity, I hadn't qualified.

Standing castration came later.

However, read my initial post and explain the horses' invariable reaction to the procedure, which was the point of my posting.

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Hannah Wynne Richards — Mon, 14 Oct 2013 09:31:15 GMT

Anthony I'm absolutely appalled that you could even consider using a muscle relaxant for castration. Unless you're even older than Queen Victoria-chloroform masks were available.

Your castration method fully justified a prosecution

Wynne

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Alex Gough — Sat, 12 Oct 2013 23:26:25 GMT

If we are thinking that vets are so much better than owners at assessing quality of life, this abstract might give food for thought - both vets and owners believed dogs were improving on placebo treatment, when in fact objective assessments showed they werent.

J Am Vet Med Assoc. 2012 Nov 15;241(10):1314-9. doi: 10.2460/javma.241.10.1314.

Caregiver placebo effect for dogs with lameness from osteoarthritis.

Conzemius MG, Evans RB.

Source

Department of Veterinary Clinical Sciences, College of Veterinary Medicine, University of Minnesota, Saint Paul, MN 55108, USA. conze012@umn.edu

Abstract

OBJECTIVE:

To document the caregiver placebo effect in owners and veterinarians of dogs with lameness from osteoarthritis.

DESIGN:

Prospective, randomized, double-blinded, placebo-controlled, multicenter clinical trial.

ANIMALS:

58 dogs with lameness secondary to osteoarthritis.

PROCEDURES:

Dogs enrolled in the placebo arm of an FDA-approved study were evaluated to determine the relationship between subjective (caregiver responses) and objective (force platform gait analysis) patient outcome measures.

RESULTS:

A caregiver placebo effect for owners evaluating their dog's lameness occurred 39.7% of the time. A caregiver placebo effect occurred 44.8% of the time when veterinarians examined dogs for lameness at a walk, 44.8% of the time when veterinarians examined dogs for lameness at a trot, and 43.1% of the time when veterinarians evaluated dogs for signs of pain on palpation of the joint. This effect was significantly enhanced with time. Mean ground reaction forces (GRFs) remained unchanged for dogs during treatment with the placebo. Individually, of 58 dogs, 5 had GRFs that worsened by ≥ 5% over 42 days, 7 had GRFs that improved by ≥ 5% over 42 days, and 46 had GRFs that remained unchanged.

CONCLUSIONS AND CLINICAL RELEVANCE:

A caregiver placebo effect was common in the evaluation of patient response to treatment for osteoarthritis by both pet owners and veterinarians. Force platform gait analysis was an unbiased outcome measure for dogs with lameness from osteoarthritis. A caregiver placebo effect should be considered when interpreting owner and veterinary reports of patient response to treatment.

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Anthony Todd — Sat, 12 Oct 2013 20:46:31 GMT

[quote user="alex gough"] the memory of the pain[/quote]

Back in the day when succinyl choline was the only way to immobilise colts for castration the invariable sequel following recovery from the total paralysis was that the horse rose to it's feet, bent down, and started eating grass as if nothing had happened showing absolutely no signs of a gruesome painful procedure at all.

As we all know, trying to get a horse to load or go through a gate when it won't is followed by a period of obvious distress, so I found the post-castration behaviour extraordinary.

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Alex Gough — Sat, 12 Oct 2013 18:00:37 GMT

Amazing how far a topic can drift - didn't think when I started this thread we would be discussing racism and abortion in it. However, there is some relevance to the suffering theme. There is undoubtedly a stage of development before which an embryo or foetus is unable to experience suffering eg sperm, ovum, zygote, four cell level. Neuroscience can help inform us as to when conscious perception of pain may be possible, but it is still a continuum, not an absolute. To confuse matters further, babies are unable to retain memories from much before they develop language. Does the fact that they won't remember an aversive experience lessen that experience? Say we had no such thing as anaesthetics, and our only option for surgery on humans was to paralyse them, fully aware and feeling, and then afterwards erase the memory of the pain. Would that be ok? Animals undoubtedly remember aversive events, but not to the extent that humans do, for example they would show fear in the presence of a situation that had previously led to pain (eg man with stick), but they probably dont go away and dwell on it after any pain and fear have gone (though I accept it could alter their longterm behaviour to some extent).

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Hannah Wynne Richards — Sat, 12 Oct 2013 13:03:21 GMT

There's also the fact that all the recent tragic and high profile cases I can think of have been poor children who WERE wanted-but for the wrong reason-to gain money from the taxpayer.

Wynne

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Hannah Wynne Richards — Sat, 12 Oct 2013 11:50:19 GMT

We'll have to agree to disagree on the morality of abortion-but you can't deny that the law hasn't kept pace with improvements in neo-natal medicine, and I find the idea that the humanity or otherwise of a baby/foetus depending on whether or not it's wanted very worrying.

The relevance to this thread is that we already differentiate between humans in considering the miscarried foetus to be capable of suffering, but not the aborted one.

Wynne

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Martin Atkinson — Sat, 12 Oct 2013 11:20:36 GMT

[quote user="Hannah Wynne Richards"]

I'm opposed to abortion-the solution is to prevent conception in the 1st place. One of the things which makes me very uneasy about the current situation is that one baby(wanted) which miscarries spontaneously is treated as a human, recieves 1st class attention-including pain relief-and survives. Another(unwanted) , of exactly the same gestational age is treated as a foetus,and aborted.This can't be right.

Wynne

[/quote]Women should have full control over their bodies. It is all very well saying that conception should be prevented in the first place but we all know this is not foolproof and some misguided religions ban it anyway. A line has to be drawn somewhere and IMO a foetus is not a sentinel being until it is screaming and breathing. I may not agree with abortion purely on the grounds that the mother doesn't like the sex of her foetus, not because of any moral argument but because it will upset the natural balance of male to female. However it is her free choice. It is far better to abort an unwanted 'baby' than force the mother to look after it unwillingly and all the problems that can then occur as we know with many recent high profile cases. 1 million aborted foetuses are better than one murdered toddler.

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Hannah Wynne Richards — Sat, 12 Oct 2013 10:10:03 GMT

Wynne

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

John Flynn — Sat, 12 Oct 2013 10:01:36 GMT

[quote user="Niall Taylor"]

I thought Alex's illustration was most eloquent. It's widely recognised in humans there is a strong psychological and learned component to pain which animals don't have:

http://www.medicine.wisc.edu/~williams/painpsychology.pdf

Hansen, G. R., and Streltzer, J., (2005) The Psychology of Pain Emergency Medicine Clinics of North America Vol. 23, pp. 339-348

This would mean that the perception of pain and the degree of "suffering" in animals is different from humans.

[/quote]

Re: RSPCA in this week's Vet Times

Niall Taylor — Sat, 12 Oct 2013 09:07:09 GMT

[quote user="John Flynn"] I've never found this convincing for a number of reasons, but accept that others might genuinely feel this to be the case[/quote]

I thought Alex's illustration was most eloquent. It's widely recognised in humans there is a strong psychological and learned component to pain which animals don't have:

http://www.medicine.wisc.edu/~williams/painpsychology.pdf

Hansen, G. R., and Streltzer, J., (2005) The Psychology of Pain Emergency Medicine Clinics of North America Vol. 23, pp. 339-348

This would mean that the perception of pain and the degree of "suffering" in animals is different from humans.

There is never an excuse for ill treating animals but that doesn't mean they deserve equal status with humans - people must always come first, although people who cause suffering to animals or other people should be punished. This is not the same as racism which is a contrived, artificial and purely social construct.

Niall