- Common Disease Name:
- Eating feces
- Medical Term for Disease:
- Copraphagia- ingestion of feces, the animal's own feces or those of another animal including those of another species such as cats and horses
- Species Affected by Disease:
- Common in dogs rare in cats
- Age Animal Usually Affected:
- Any
- Commonly Affected Breeds:
- Any
- Sex Usually Affected:
- Nursing females
- Disease Symptoms:
- Bad breath, vomiting, diarrhea, weight loss are signs of the common underlying medical problems associated with coprophagia
- Method(s) of Diagnosis:
- Put Your Text Here
- Disease Causes:
- The only circumstance in which coprophagia is considered a normal behavior is when a bitch eats the feces of her pups from the time of their birth until about 3 weeks of age. It is thought she does this to keep the nest area clean until the pups are able to move away from the nest area to defecate. It may also be considered a natural, although not normal, behavior for dogs to eat feces of cattle, goats, sheep and horses, containing large amounts of nutrients remaining after intestinal fermentation, which may have helped to sustain dogs in the wild when no other food source was available. Dogs also commonly eat the feces of cats with which they share a household. Theorized behavioral causes are responding to punishment for defecating in inappropriate locations by removing the evidence, imitating the owner's behavior of removing feces, or stressful conditions such as sudden changes in lifestyle or environment Many have thought some dogs eat feces because of dietary deficiencies, but there is little information to support this theory. Medical reasons for copraphagia are steroid administration which increases appetite, intestinal malabsorption disorder, intestinal parasites, diabetes mellitus, hyperthyroidism, Cushing's disease, or exocrine pancreatic insufficiency.
- Treatment:
- Treatment varies depending on whether the cause of the coprophagia is behavioral or medical. If underlying disease is found and treated, coprophagia may resolve. Behavioral coprophagia can be treated in a number of ways. Picking up the stools is probably the most reliable solution. One method is to have the owners walk the dog on a leash so that the dog can be taken away from the feces immediately. At the time of defecation, the owner can also give the dog a food reward so that it will become conditioned to expect food at defecation instead of looking for feces. In the case of a dog eating cat feces, litter pans should be cleaned daily and covered or placed in a location unavailable to the dog.
If the dog is let outside unattended, methods of punishment can be used. Most often a hot or unpleasant tasting substance such as pepper is placed on the feces. However, many dogs learn to eat the untreated feces. Another method is to inject hot sauce into the feces to make it more difficult for the dog to avoid treated feces. Adding meat tenderizer or pancreatic enzymes to the dog's food makes their own feces taste unpleasant to some dogs, although they may continue to eat the feces of other dogs or animals. Taste aversion treatment with a substance (apomorphoine) that makes the dog vomit is thought to be most effective if the behavior is new. Occasionally, making a change in the dog's diet is successful even if dietary deficiency does not play a role. A change in the consistency or flavor of the stools may be the explanation
for this method's success. - Prognosis:
- Guarded to poor - very hard habit to break.
- Complications:
- Recurrent infection with intestinal parasites, gastroenteritis results from consumption of large amounts of ungulate (cows, etc) and horse feces.
- Prevention:
- Clean up stool as soon as possible.
- Medicines Used for Treatment of Disease:
- Forbid @TM
- Helpful Products:
- Good nutritional dog food, leash with clean up bags for walking, poop scoopers
