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Zoobiquity
Cover of Zoobiquity
Zoobiquity
What Animals Can Teach Us About Health and the Science of Healing
Borrow Borrow

A revelatory depiction of what animals can teach us about the human body and mind, exploring how animal and human commonality can be used to diagnose, treat, and heal patients of all species.
"Full of fascinating stories.” —Atul Gawande, M.D.
Do animals overeat? Get breast cancer? Have fainting spells? Inspired by an eye-opening consultation at the Los Angeles Zoo, which revealed that a monkey experienced the same symptoms of heart failure as human patients, cardiologist Barbara Natterson-Horowitz embarked upon a project that would reshape how she practiced medicine.
Beginning with the above questions, she began informally researching every affliction that she encountered in humans to learn whether it happened with animals, too. And usually, it did: dinosaurs suffered from brain cancer, koalas can catch chlamydia, reindeer seek narcotic escape in hallucinogenic mushrooms, stallions self-mutilate, and gorillas experience clinical depression.
Natterson-Horowitz and science writer Kathryn Bowers have dubbed this pan-species approach to medicine zoobiquity
New York Times Bestseller
An O, The Oprah Magazine “Summer Reading” Pick
Discover Magazine Best Book

A revelatory depiction of what animals can teach us about the human body and mind, exploring how animal and human commonality can be used to diagnose, treat, and heal patients of all species.
"Full of fascinating stories.” —Atul Gawande, M.D.
Do animals overeat? Get breast cancer? Have fainting spells? Inspired by an eye-opening consultation at the Los Angeles Zoo, which revealed that a monkey experienced the same symptoms of heart failure as human patients, cardiologist Barbara Natterson-Horowitz embarked upon a project that would reshape how she practiced medicine.
Beginning with the above questions, she began informally researching every affliction that she encountered in humans to learn whether it happened with animals, too. And usually, it did: dinosaurs suffered from brain cancer, koalas can catch chlamydia, reindeer seek narcotic escape in hallucinogenic mushrooms, stallions self-mutilate, and gorillas experience clinical depression.
Natterson-Horowitz and science writer Kathryn Bowers have dubbed this pan-species approach to medicine zoobiquity
New York Times Bestseller
An O, The Oprah Magazine “Summer Reading” Pick
Discover Magazine Best Book

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Excerpts-
  • From the book CONTENTS

    Authors’ Note    ix

    ONE   

    Dr. House, Meet Doctor Dolittle    3
    Redefining the Boundaries of Medicine

    TWO   

    The Feint of Heart    19
    Why We Pass Out

    THREE   

    Jews, Jaguars, and Jurassic Cancer    31
    New Hope for an Ancient Diagnosis

    FOUR

    Roar-gasm 55
    An Animal Guide to Human Sexuality

    FIVE
    Zoophoria 87
    Getting High and Getting Clean

    SIX   
    Scared to Death    109
    Heart Attacks in the Wild

    SEVEN   
    Fat Planet    132
    Why Animals Get Fat and How They Get Thin

    EIGHT

    Grooming Gone Wild    159
    Pain, Pleasure, and the Origins of Self-Injury

    NINE
    Fear of Feeding    176
    Eating Disorders in the Animal Kingdom

    TEN
    The Koala and the Clap    194
    The Hidden Power of Infection


    ELEVEN

    Leaving the Nest    212
    Animal Adolescence and the Risky Business of Growing Up

    TWELVE

    Zoobiquity 234

    Acknowledgments 245
    Notes 249
    Index 293



    CHAPTER ONE

    Dr. House, Meet Doctor Dolittle
    Redefining the Boundaries of Medicine


    In the spring of 2005, the chief veterinarian of the Los Angeles Zoo called me, an urgent edge to his voice.

    “Uh, listen, Barbara? We’ve got an emperor tamarin in heart failure. Any chance you could come out today?”

    I reached for my car keys. For thirteen years I’d been a cardiologist treating members of my own species at the UCLA Medical Center. From time to time, however, the zoo veterinarians asked me to weigh in on some of their more difficult animal cases. Because UCLA is a leading heart-transplant hospital, I’d had a front-row view of every type of human heart failure. But heart failure in a tamarin—a tiny, nonhuman primate? That I’d never seen. I threw my bag in the car and headed for the lush, 113-acre zoo nestled along the eastern edge of Griffith Park.

    Into the tiled exam room the veterinary assistant carried a small bundle wrapped in a pink blanket.

    “This is Spitzbuben,” she said, lowering the animal gently into a Plexiglas-fronted examination box. My own heart did a little flip. Emperor tamarins are, in a word, adorable. About the size of kittens, these monkeys evolved in the treetops of the Central and South American rain forests. Their wispy, white Fu Manchu–style mustaches droop below enormous brown eyes. Swaddled in the pink blanket, staring up at me with that liquid gaze, Spitzbuben was pushing every maternal button I had.

    When I’m with a human patient who seems anxious, especially a child, I crouch close and open my eyes wide. Over the years I’ve seen how this can establish a trust bond and put a nervous patient at ease. I did this with Spitzbuben. I wanted this defenseless little animal to understand how much I felt her vulnerability, how hard I would work to help her. I moved my face up to the box and stared deep in her eyes—animal to animal. It was working. She sat very still, her eyes locked on mine through the scratched plastic. I pursed my lips and cooed.

    “Sooo brave, little Spitzbuben . . . ”

    Suddenly I felt a strong hand on my shoulder.

    “Please stop making eye contact with...
About the Author-
  • Barbara Natterson-Horowitz, M.D., earned her degrees at Harvard and the University of California, San Francisco. She is a cardiology professor at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and serves on the medical advisory board of the Los Angeles. Zoo as a cardiovascular consultant. Her writing has appeared in many scientific and medical publications.

    Kathryn Bowers
    was a staff editor at The Atlantic and a writer and producer at CNN International. She has edited and written popular and academic books and teaches a course at UCLA on medical narrative.
Reviews-
  • Publisher's Weekly

    April 23, 2012
    The fossil record indicates that dinosaurs developed cancer. Chlamydia is rampant in wild koala bear populations. Wallabies in Tasmania are hooked on opium. In this intriguing book, cardiologist and psychiatrist Natterson-Horowitz, along with science journalist Bowers, explore some of humanity’s most pressing health problems (cancer, obesity) through the eyes of the animal kingdom. The authors argue in favor of the “One Health” worldview, which brings doctors and veterinarians into close collaboration to discuss causation and treatment of diseases. For example, since stress-induced heart attacks affect both humans and animals, who’s to say that human doctors can’t learn from the research of veterinarians, and vice versa? The book features countless intriguing anecdotes of cross-species health problems, such as the cocker spaniel who became addicted to licking a toad or the stallion with mating problems, as well as some unforgettable one-liners: “all male mammals descend from a shared ancestral ejaculator.” But the memorable examples are intended to serve the greater purpose of emphatically demonstrating that doctors and veterinarians would benefit from working together. Despite the remarkable content, the book’s formulaic structure means that it is best consumed in small bites. Still, after finishing, you’re guaranteed to never look at your dog, cat, or any other animal the same way again. Agent: Tina Bennett, Janklow & Nesbit.

  • Kirkus

    May 1, 2012
    Natterson-Horowitz (Cardiology/UCLA School of Medicine) and former Atlantic Monthly editor Bowers investigate the correlation between human and animal health issues. Cancer, heart attacks, obesity and STDs are afflictions most people associate with humans. However, the authors demonstrate that these are also common ailments in the animal world. Fascinated with the health connection between animals and humans, the authors coin the term "zoobiquity," which means the "connecting, species-spanning approach to the diagnostic and therapeutic puzzles of clinical medicine." By accepting our common genetic backgrounds, the authors propose an increase in the exchange of medical information between doctors and veterinarians, as human behavior parallels that of animals in many different arenas. Masturbation, homosexuality and rape are common in the animal world. The "feather-picking disorder" of birds plucking feathers until they bleed is similar to the "cutting" teenage girls administer to themselves. Anorexia can be linked to the nervous behaviors of our "animal forebears," who lived with the constant fear of not having enough to eat, or of being eaten. The wild behavior of some adolescent males mimics the impulsive antics of still-maturing rats and primates. Sudden noises or traumatic accidents and natural disasters cause an uptick in cardiomyopathy in humans and animals, even if there is no evidence of heart disease in either species. Whether discussing koala bears with chlamydia, stallions with performance dysfunction, or Tasmanian wallabies intoxicated on poppy sap, the authors provide solid evidence that humans are not as far removed from the rest of the natural world as we might have thought. Engaging, useful account of the similarities between humans and other animals.

    COPYRIGHT(2012) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

  • Library Journal

    January 1, 2012

    A cardiology professor at UCLA's David Geffen School of Medicine, Natterson-Horowitz was called in as a consultant when a monkey at the Los Angeles Zoo had heart failure. Subsequently, she launched an interdisciplinary study (here dubbed zoobiquity) of what animals and humans have in common in sickness and healing. Health care and animal-human bonding, it's bound to attract attention.

    Copyright 2012 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

  • Booklist

    Starred review from May 15, 2012
    Our ancestors knew that animals suffer the same diseases as humans, but as modern medicine developed, a great schism grew between physicians and veterinarians. Cardiologist and psychiatrist Natterson-Horowitz now calls for a new species-spanning approach to medicine and health. She and science writer Bowers coined the term zoobiquity for this emerging field, and they present their case with winning enthusiasm and expertise. Natterson-Horowitz, astute and funny, recounts her mind-expanding zoobiquitous expeditions involving a remarkable array of mammals, birds, reptiles, fish, and insects and explicates the genetic and evolutionary roots of her revelatory discoveries. Not only do animals faint but fainting can be essential to survival, leading Natterson-Horowitz to modify a classic phrase to Fight, flight, or faint. Even more arresting are her revelations about animals, intoxication, and addiction (including a Texan cocker spaniel who loved to lick cane toads for the hallucinogenic toxin in their skin). Her investigation into animal sex redefines natural acts, and her coverage of animal adolescence and eating disorders is fascinating and instructive. Clearly, we have much to learn from animals and from this profoundly illuminating new fusion of veterinary, human, and evolutionary medicine. Zoobiquity is as clarion and perception-altering as works by Oliver Sacks, Michael Pollan, and E. O. Wilson.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)

  • Atul Gawande, M.D. "Zoobiquity is full of fascinating stories of intersection between human and nonhuman medicine -- fish that faint; dinosaur cancers; human treatments that cure dogs of melanoma; lessons from adolescent elephant behavior that explain human teenagers. I was beguiled."
  • Stephen Stearns, PhD., Edward P. Bass Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Yale University "Centered on an insight rich with consequences, this beautifully written book is loaded with fascinating material that makes a compelling case for viewing human health and disease comparatively. We have more to learn from other species than I had ever suspected. Gripping and memorably engaging, it belongs in the hands of anyone with an ounce of curiosity about the biological sources of the human condition."
  • Temple Grandin, Ph.D. "Fascinating reading about the similarities in both the physiology and behavior of people and animals."
  • Booklist "astute and funny... revelatory...Zoobiquity is as clarion and perception-altering as works by Oliver Sacks, Michael Pollan, and E. O. Wilson."
  • Publisher's Weekly "The book features countless intriguing anecdotes of cross-species health problems...after finishing, you're guaranteed to never look at your dog, cat, or any other animal the same way again."
  • Library Journal, 12/12/11 "A groundbreaker written for the lay reader."
  • Library Journal, 8/17/12 "Engaging and accessible...This book not only speaks to the medical zeitgeist, it is also often profound. It will appeal to readers of Temple Grandin, Oliver Sacks, Neil Shubin, E.O. Wilson, Atul Gawande, and others writing about medicine and health. Highly recommended."
  • Politics & Prose "Like the best narrative nonfiction, this book will appeal to a wide range of readers...But this book is more than popular science; by combining human and veterinary medicine, the authors seek to change our view of the human place in the animal kingdom, and, with it, the way we treat illness, regardless of the species of the sufferer...vivid and illuminating."
  • New York Journal of Books "a very credible argument for collaboration between disciplines...entertaining and beautifully written."
  • New Scientist "you will find the argument hard to resist. Plus you will have some killer dinner party gems. Who could resist the story of lemurs with erectile dysfunction, or the iguanas that ejaculate prematurely?"
  • Kirkus Review "the authors provide solid evidence that humans are not as far removed from the rest of the natural world as we might have thought. Engaging, useful account of the similarities between humans and other animals."
  • The Globe and Mail "Zoobiquity reinforces the interconnectedness of life on Earth...In another words, we're all in this together."
  • The Boston Globe "Illuminating...This very engaging book is difficult to put down. It provides lots of information in an easy-to-understand manner that doesn't feel overwhelming, perhaps because of the liberal use of humor throughout. Reading Zoobiquity gave this reader a totally new perspective on his furred and feathered neighbors."
  • Yale Human Animal Medicine Project "Groundbreaking...essential...truly innovative...the concepts in Zoobiquity are presented so clearly and documented so extensively that they appear to have struck a chord in both the general population and the medical community."
  • The Bark "A truly fascinating look at the similarities between us and other animals...engrossing and enlightening reading."
  • Santa Barbara Independent "An entertaining and insightful series of anecdotes, bolstered by the latest in medical and veterinary science..."
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What Animals Can Teach Us About Health and the Science of Healing
Barbara Natterson-Horowitz
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