Downing Roberta, Della Rocca Giorgia
The Downing Center for Animal Pain Management, Windsor, CO 80550, USA.
Research Center on Animal Pain, Department of Veterinary Medicine, University of Perugia, 06126 Perugia, Italy.
Animals (Basel). 2023 Jan 19;13(3):355. doi: 10.3390/ani13030355.
Animals do not speak a language humans understand, making it easy to believe that they do not experience pain the way humans do. Despite data affirming that companion animals can and do experience pain much as do humans, there remains a gap between companion animal acute pain management knowledge and its execution. Companion animal pain is not simply a physiological issue. Veterinary clinicians can and should embrace the foundational principles of clinical bioethics-respect for autonomy, nonmaleficence, beneficence, and justice-translated from human medicine for the benefit of their patients. By reframing companion animal pain as a bioethical issue, as described in this paper, veterinarians affirm their commitment to closing the gap between what is known and what is done for painful companion animals. This takes pet pain beyond physiology.
动物不会说人类能懂的语言，这很容易让人认为它们不会像人类一样感受疼痛。尽管有数据表明伴侣动物能够且确实会像人类一样感受疼痛，但在伴侣动物急性疼痛管理知识及其实施之间仍存在差距。伴侣动物的疼痛不仅仅是一个生理问题。兽医临床医生能够且应该接受临床生物伦理学的基本原则——尊重自主权、不伤害、有利和公正——这些原则是从人类医学中借鉴而来，以造福于他们的患者。正如本文所描述的，通过将伴侣动物的疼痛重新界定为一个生物伦理学问题，兽医们肯定了他们致力于弥合针对疼痛的伴侣动物的已知与实际行动之间差距的承诺。这将宠物疼痛问题的范畴从生理层面进行了拓展。
