Companion Animal Behaviour – Part 2

In order to fully benefit from this second part of the course it is vital that delegates have fresh in their minds some of the salient learning points from part 1. Most delegates will hopefully be able to progress through this first module fairly quickly and then crack on with the rest of the course.

This module will include training of more specific tasks such as administering medication and working with dogs and cats that have already learned fear responses to certain contexts. We will discuss the use of operant and counter-conditioning and how to apply this to specific examples such as cue training for clinical examination, applying ear drops, clipping nails and training the hand target used in the first course.

This module will use cases studies to discuss the role of medical conditions in behaviour. The main focus will be on pain but other conditions will also be discussed. Delegates are advised to review their notes from Module 5 of Course 1 prior to working on this module.

This module will look more in depth at some specific cases that required the use of psychoactive medication and will discuss the reasons behind the need to use medication as well as the more specific information relating to drug choice.

This module will review the decision-making processes for referral particularly focussing on risk assessment in aggression cases.  Two cases will be covered, one focussing on the learning processes at play in a dog-dog aggression case and the other focussing on the learning processes at play in a dog-human aggression case.