Care Homes Say No To Pets

Despite considerable medical evidence supporting the beneficial health aspects of owning and stroking a pet, only 4% of residential/nursing homes in the UK offer accommodation for pet owners and just one in seven keeps their own cat for residents to interact with. This lack of provision for elderly or less able animal lovers is highlighted in a survey carried out by Cats Protection.

Not allowing residents their own pets means that both animals and owners have to go through the trauma of separation. Cats Protection takes in over 11,000 cats a year because the original owners have moved into residential or nursing homes, and although the charity is successful in rehoming these cats, some will nevertheless remain at a branch or shelter because no home can be found for them.

Cats Protection is therefore calling on long stay residential care homes which do not currently allow cats to consider doing so in the light of what is now known about the beneficial effects of contact with pets. These benefits are becoming increasingly well known among people of all ages as the Cats Protection survey indicates.

Overall, three quarters of those questioned believed that regular contact with cats makes elderly people healthier, happier and more relaxed. Specifically, 70% felt residents seemed more content, 84% that they seemed happier, 54% healthier and 45% more relaxed.

• 65% agreed it was unfair that people should have to give up a much loved cat or other pet when they entered residential care.
• 74% agreed that it would be more difficult for cat owners to find a long stay care home which would accommodate their pet.
• 77% said they believed that where a residential home did not allow individual cats it should have a communal home cat, to be shared and enjoyed by all residents.

Cats Protection survey supports the findings of research conducted by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation two years ago which revealed that one in five homes for older people, and one in 20 homes for children or people with learning difficulties, reported not having any written policy on pets. The survey also revealed that when homes considered the issue, most had decided to allow residents to keep pets.

Cats Protection Chief Executive believes that in the long term residential care homes will have to develop a pet keeping policy, as the elderly population escalates over the next 10-15 years.

"The Rowntree Foundation recommends the keeping of cats and other pets in long stay care homes and this can be achieved easily, given the will to do so and a policy which ensures that residents who do not like cats and other animals are not confronted with them. When elderly people are parted from their pets, the sense of trauma and bereavement is substantial and can contribute to psychological and physical illness. We believe that where practical and feasible, every residential home should allow residents to keep their cats or at least have a resident cat for the enjoyment of everyone living there." he said.

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