How to Spot Dementia in Your Dog or Cat

Dementia isn't a uniquely human trait. With age, dogs and cats can also experience cognitive dysfunction.

In dogs, it can happen as early as 8 years old, with roughly 10% of dogs affected at that age. The percentage increases with age. In cats, symptoms typically emerge around age 10.

Researchers at Texas A&M University's College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences offer these early telltale signs:

-- Wandering aimlessly

-- Having accidents in the house

-- Struggling to navigate doorways or stairs

-- Changes in hearing or responsiveness

-- Vocalizing more than usual

Vets diagnose cognitive dysfunction by comprehensively reviewing the animal's behavior with owners. They may also perform blood tests, combined with physical and neurologic exams, to rule out other conditions.

Like people, there is no current cure for dementia in dogs or cats. Treatment typically involves changes to manage symptoms and support quality of life, such as regular exercise and quality time with caregivers. Foods rich in medium-chain triglycerides and antioxidants such as vitamin E and omega-3s may help improve clinical signs. While manufactured diets containing these ingredients are available for dogs, similar options have not been developed for cats.

Body of Knowledge

The ashes of the average cremated person weigh between three and nine pounds.

Get Me That, Stat!

In a new international study by researchers at the University of Copenhagen, psychiatrists assessing the same patient independently agreed on the diagnosis in just 55% of cases.

Doc Talk

Meatus: A natural opening, passage or canal in the body that typically leads from an inner space to the outside, such as the external opening of the urethra, the ear canal and the nasal cavity.

Mania of the Week

Klazomania: Compulsive shouting

Life in Big Macs

One hour of having your nails done by someone else burns 68 calories (based on a 150-pound person), the equivalent of 0.1 Big Macs.

Food for Thought

Rendered beef fat or tallow isn't necessarily a bad thing. It can act as a food texturizer and moisturizer, and in small quantities, it's virtually flavorless. But it shows up in surprising places, such as Twinkies, which is why the enduring sponge cake treat is deemed unsuitable for vegetarians and vegans.

Best Medicine

A man visits an urgent care center after experiencing symptoms of a heart attack.

"I had taken our cat to the vet," he tells the attending nurse, "and while I was there, my chest got tight, I had trouble breathing, and later, my left arm began aching."

The nurse looks at the man with great concern.

"What was wrong with the cat?" she asks.

Observation

"A ruffled mind makes a restless pillow." -- English novelist Charlotte Bronte (1816-1855). Though widely credited to Bronte, the line is actually spoken by the narrator William Crimsworth in her first novel, "The Professor."

Medical History

This week in 1928, the iron lung was used by its first patient, a young girl at the Children's Hospital in Boston. It was an artificial respirator that enabled her to breathe despite being paralyzed by polio.

This negative pressure ventilator, invented by a young Harvard doctor named Philip Drinker, was the first widely used device of its kind. From the neck down, the patient's body lay in a sealed galvanized iron box. The 3-by-7-foot, 700-pound apparatus ran on two household vacuum cleaners. As air was pumped out of the metal box, the patient's lungs drew in air, which was expelled as the air pump cycle next increased pressure to mimic a normal breathing rate.

Martha Ann Lillard was the last person known to use an iron lung daily. Lillard contracted polio in 1953 at the age of 5 and relied upon the machine until her death on June 26, 2026, at the age of 78.

Self-Exam

Q: Which body part lies above the other -- philtrum or glabella?

A: The glabella is the smooth space between your eyebrows, above your nose. The philtrum is the cleft between the bottom of the nose and the top lip.

Medical Myths

A common and popular antidote to drinking too much alcohol is gulping down coffee, which is presumed to have a sobering effect. It doesn't. Coffee contains caffeine, which stimulates the nervous system and can make the imbiber feel more alert, but they are no less inebriated (and alcohol is a depressant, meaning it slows your brain down, making you clumsier and slower in your reactions).

The only way to reduce the effects of intoxication is to wait while the body naturally eliminates the alcohol from your system.

Last Words

"Throw a quilt over her." -- King Frederick II of Prussia (1712-1786), speaking to a valet after noticing that his pet greyhound was shivering

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To find out more about Scott LaFee and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.