It is unclear what impact pheromonotherapy has on stress in dogs in shelter environments

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Appraisal, application and reflection

According to BSAVA (2017), Adaptil®, formally branded as D.A.P®, (Ceva Santé Animale) is the only pheromone-based product on general sale in the UK for use in dogs. It is therefore unsurprising that although neither of the studies reviewed was supported by Ceva both used Adaptil® products as their interventions. Ceva published comprehensive references which support Adaptil’s® efficacy in various settings (Ceva Santé Animale, 2015). Of the two studies Ceva cites to support Adaptil’s® use in a shelter setting, one was assessed in this Knowledge Summary (Tod et al., 2005), the other was excluded from assessment because it was only published as part of a conference proceeding. The study (Barlow & Goodwin, 2009) was a double-blind placebo-controlled trial of Dog Appeasing Pheromone (D.A.P®) infused collars, total sample size was 90 dogs (31 treated collars, 29 placebo collars, 30 controls with no collars) and lasted 10 days. If it had been included this study would have had the largest sample size and longest duration, its results could have added power to the conclusions drawn in this Knowledge Summary, however as the study was published in short form, its methodology was not described in detail and it was not possible to evaluate and critique the paper to the degree necessary for inclusion in a Knowledge Summary.

In the two studies reviewed the dogs were exposed to pheromonotherapy for 30 minutes (Hermiston et al., 2018) and 7 days (Tod et al., 2005), both of which are consistent with the onset of actions advertised by Ceva (Adaptil® transport spray should act ‘almost immediately’ whilst the Adaptil® diffuser should be fully functional within 24 hours (Ceva Santé Animale, 2020)). However, the study durations are short when compared to the 7–21 days target overall length of stay in American shelters (UC Davis Koret Shelter Medicine Programme, 2017) and that Brown et al. (2013) found that the average length of stay for an adult dog in a no-kill shelter is 42 days. This is significant as the interventions applied do not reflect the realities that dogs experience, so these studies cannot accurately predict what impact pheromonotherapy will have in a shelter environment. Additionally, although both studies identified statistically significant reductions in barking amplitude, neither study was able to establish if this reduction was clinically relevant.

Sales et al. (1997) showed that barking has a negative impact on welfare, therefore using barking as part of a composite measure for welfare could be justified. However, barking is also a non-specific behaviour indicative of elevated arousal not stress, fear, or welfare specifically (Protopopova, 2016; and Yin, 2002), which may be socially motivated in shelter environments (Taylor & Mills, 2007). Additionally, barking behaviours and motivation may have a breed specific component (Pongrácz et al., 2010) which was not controlled for in these studies. Therefore, without further research into the emotional motivations for barking the use of barking amplitude, frequency, or duration as a proxy measure for stress is a limitation for the studies assessed.

Finally, excessive vocalisation was not included in the quality of life assessment tool developed by Kiddie & Collins (2014) because in a shelter or kennel environment dogs are rarely in auditory or visual isolation which may emphasise the aforementioned social component which can motivate barking. For these reasons future studies may gain more insight into the emotional status of dogs in shelter environments if they chose to assess factors included in the validated quality of life assessment tool.

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