Video Story
Watch VideoPets on Prozac: calming your Nervous Nellie Collie
Story By: NBC
Source: NBC
Anxious, irritable, shortness of breath, having trouble sleeping?
If this sounds like a prescription drug commercial, you're not far off.
Take one look at Maria Waits' dog Rocky and you would never know that he's been diagnosed with an anxiety disorder.
"Rocky just needs somebody there all the time. Ever since I brought him home, he'd follow me from room to room. Wherever I go, he goes," said Waits.
But that's part of the problem, because whenever Maria leaves the house, rocky has a panic attack.
"His whole body is just shivering and shaking," said Waits.
He urinates and defecates on the floor.
He chews on the doorframe.
Things Rocky has never done over the past 11 years, until just recently.
So Maria took Rocky to see Dr. Rachel Malamed, an animal behavior specialist at UC Davis who suggested that Maria set up a nanny-cam to record Rocky's rocky behavior.
"All of these behaviors that he is exhibiting are indicative of anxiety. A relaxed dog would be lying on the floor or maybe just wandering about but if you look at his body postures, you can see he's just standing there. He barks at the door, then he paces around some more, and he's back and forth the entire time," explained Malamed.
In fact, in the video Maria's other dog Coco is sleeping, while Rocky frantically runs from room to room looking for his owner.
Dr. Malamed treats separation anxiety in pets on a weekly basis, but warns don't jump to conclusions if your pet starts acting strange.
"It's really important to rule out underlying medical illness that could be contributing to these behaviors," said Malamed.
Once separation anxiety has been diagnosed, Dr. Malamed uses behavior modification and sometimes medication, like Prozac, to treat animals.
And in Rocky's case it's working.
"Every time I have given it to him so far he hasn't defecated or urinated in the house which is fantastic, so it's definitely helping," said Waits.
Helping along with a training program to get rocky used to being inside the house without Maria.
"I practice leaving but I really don't leave. I'll pick up my keys throughout the day, I'll pick up my purse, I'll set it on the counter like I'm going to leave," explained Waits.
Dr. Malamed says that Prozac should only be used as a supplement to this kind of training.
"There's no magic pill and I think that's a big misconception and many people think that these are going to fix their pets and they're not," said Malamed.
But for some people and pets, the results are tried and true.
