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A study developed by researchers at the Center for Research in Health Technologies and Services (Cinntesis) warns of the increase in “animal accumulation” and recommends that “urgent” interventions be improved for people with Noah Syndrome.
In a statement, the Porto research center explains that the study, published in the Mental Health Magazine Óscar Ribeiro’s team, warns of the increase in the “accumulation of animals worldwide”. “Professionals want to support people who have this problem, but they face various difficulties, mainly due to the lack of information on effective intervention strategies”, refer the study authors.
According to the researchers, animal hoarders are people who often live “in a precarious situation”, especially women, the elderly and “often in conditions of vulnerability and isolation”, who tend to accumulate a single species of animal. . “These people tend to neglect themselves and animals, who can starve, get sick and even die without proper care,” they say.
Hoarding is recognized as a mental disorder, which integrates the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Illnesses from the American Psychiatric Association.
In the study, the researchers say that the care provided to people with Noah Syndrome has been “too” directed to respond to emergency situations, in which “degradation and abandonment are already at extreme levels.”
As the main problems, the researchers point out the “lack of coordination between the different intervening organizations” and the existence of priority objectives that diverge between animal associations, veterinarians, social and health services, municipalities and courts.
At the same time, they consider that there is still a “lack of education and training” for health professionals who “serve this population”, as well as a “lack of recognition” of the mental health component of this problem.
Cited in the statement, Sara Guerra, first author of the study, maintains that “without a concerted and long-term approach, the recurrence rate is currently close to 100%.” “Virtually all hoarders are or will be repeat offenders. This is a reality that frustrates professionals and the community itself ”, emphasizes the researcher from Cintesis.
The team of researchers defends, therefore, the need to “place accumulating animals, such as people with a mental health problem, at the center of the intervention, without limiting the focus of attention to accumulated animals.” In this sense, they leave a series of recommendations in the study, such as multidisciplinary intervention plans, training of professionals and the community through awareness campaigns.
The researchers now intend to continue the study, that is, to understand that the strategies and interventions are used by entities and professionals to proceed with a “national systematization” and the “creation of intervention guidelines”.
