Puppies On Prozac

By Andrea Sachs

How It Started: Veterinarians saw a chance to help pets in distress Judgment: When pets are happy, their owners are happy too

Sit. Heel. Mellow. An increasing number of veterinarians are prescribing human psychiatric medications for dogs and cats with behavior problems. The drugs have not yet been specifically approved for this purpose by the FDA, although the practice is legal. Says Nicholas Dodman, director of the Tufts University Animal Behavior Clinic and author of a new book, If Only They Could Speak: Stories About Pets and Their People (Norton): "It's got to the point now that if you don't know something about behavior-modifying drugs, you can't provide full treatment." Mild cases of misbehavior involving housebreaking and chewing are still handled with conventional treatments: training, along with diet and exercise changes. More serious problems--overly aggressive dogs, compulsive lickers and tail chasers, cats that urinate all over the house--are often treated with well-known antidepressants (Paxil, Zoloft, Prozac). Not surprisingly, some pets end up on the same medicines as their owners. That fuels some vets' criticism that the treatment is just an exercise in anthropomorphizing the animals. But Dodman, a pioneer in this field, writes of Romeo, a King Charles spaniel that was a compulsive licker. Romeo also barked constantly, to his owner's and the neighbors' distress. Prozac was prescribed, says Dodman, and it kept the puppy from being put down by its exasperated owner. --By Andrea Sachs