Diabetes in People, Cats, and Dogs: Biomedicine and Manifold Ontologies

Abstract

If people express salient beliefs and values in caring for pets then it is worth considering that dogs and housecats are routinely treated using the biomedical armamentarium. To investigate animal-human connections in the treatment of dogs and housecats for diabetes, we conducted ethnographic interviews in Canada with 12 pet owners and six health professionals in conjunction with a review of documentation on diabetes in cats, dogs, and people. Treating dogs and housecats for diabetes, we conclude, pivots on recognition of these animals as sentient selves. At the same time, treating diabetes in dogs and housecats helps to produce a named disease as a physical thing. In treating a housecat or a dog for diabetes, pet owners breach one of the foundational distinctions of Western science: human and nonhuman bodies exhibit continuity in terms of physicality, but a fundamental discontinuity exists when it comes to interiority.

Key Words:

• anthrozoology
• biomedicine
• Canada
• cognitive anthropology
• companion animals
• diabetes mellitus
• explanatory models
• medical anthropology
• pets
• science and technology studies
• valuation
• veterinary medicine

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The authors would like to thank the pet owners and the health care professionals who were interviewed for this study as well as those who helped with recruitment. They also thank Melissa Jakobfi, Bonnie Phoung, and Shanna Sunley for assisting with the research; Lisa Kozleski for her help with copy-editing and with shepherding this article through the publication process; and Steve Ferzacca, Eric Mykhalovskiy, Thomas Schlich, and three anonymous reviewers for their incisive comments. Funding for this research came from a Population Health Investigator award from the Alberta Heritage Foundation for Medical Research to Melanie Rock (AHFMR-200600378); the 2006 Petro-Canada Young Innovator in Community Health research prize to Rock; a New Investigator in Societal and Cultural Dimensions of Health Award from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research to Rock (CIHR-200609MSH-83745); and a Standard Research Grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada to Rock as principal investigator and to Eric Mykhalovskiy and Thomas Schlich as co-investigators (SSHRC-410-204-2152).

Notes

In this article, we use the more conventional terms of “pet” and “pet owner” and not terms such as “companion animal” or “human companion.” We are certainly aware, however, that many people value these animals for their companionship. For further discussion of companion and companionship in cross-species relationships, see Haraway's (2003, 2008) recent work.

The dogs used in the research that culminated in insulin therapy were not diabetic, however, until the surgical removal of their pancreas (Bliss 2000 [1982]).

The Calgary map shows six, rather than nine, dots because four of the pet owners residing in Calgary volunteered to be interviewed as couples, and because two additional pet owners live in separate households but share the same postal code.

“Neighborhood” is defined in this table as the “dissemination area” for census data collected for the Government of Canada in 2000. These dissemination areas were linked to pet owners' postal codes using the Statistics Canada's postal code conversion file, September 2006 update. Two of the postal codes linked to more than one dissemination area. To choose the most appropriate location for these two postal codes, the single link indicator function from the conversion file was used. The table shows neighborhood median household income and dominant educational attainment for the neighborhood at the time of recruitment. Two pet owners have moved, however, since being recruited in 2006.

This research project has been approved by the University of Calgary's Conjoint Health Research Ethics Board (tracking number, 18060).

All transcript excerpts have been lightly edited to make them easier to read.

Mol titled her book The Body Multiple, but in a crucial passage, refers to “manyfoldedness” in reality: “This, then, is what I would like the term multiple to convey: there is manyfoldedness, but not pluralism. In the hospital the body (singular) is multiple (many). The drawing together of a diversity of objects that go by a single name involves various modes of coordination.” (Mol 2002, 84)

In using a word like “decide,” we do not mean to imply that diabetes treatment or euthanasia are matters of unfettered or free choice (Mol 2006; Mykhalovskiy 2008).

Disease enactments, according to Mol, take place in and as a result of extensive networks made up of practices, techniques, and so on. People form part of these networks but they are not the subjects.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Melanie Rock

MELANIE ROCK holds the position of Assistant Professor in the Department of Community Health Sciences at the University of Calgary in Alberta, Canada. Additional affiliations include the University of Montreal's interdisciplinary health research group and the University of Calgary's Department of Anthropology, Faculty of Social Work, Centre for Health and Policy Studies, and Population Health Intervention Research Centre. Her current research focuses on animal-human connections in health care and in health promotion. She may be reached at: [email protected]

Patricia Babinec

Patricia Babinec originally trained as a pharmacist at the University of Alberta and remains active in the profession. More recently, she completed a BA followed by an MA in communication studies at the University of Calgary. In September 2008, she entered the PhD program in the Graduate Division of Educational Research at the University of Calgary. Ms. Babinec has also taught as a sessional instructor in the Faculty of Communication and Culture at the University of Calgary and is a member of the Southern Alberta Primary Care Research Network team (SAPCReN). She may be reached at [email protected]