Wellness as welfare

While conservation and education are the most visible priorities of successful zoos and aquariums, a growing emphasis on science and animal welfare looms as the next frontier. The science of animal welfare paved the way for welfare practice [Maple and Perdue, 2013], with significant advances in agriculture and biomedicine as the historic antecedents of zoo animal welfare. Although welfare practice is expanding, there are still many zoos and aquariums that avoid using the appellation of welfare and almost all of them recognize conservation, not welfare, as their first institutional priority. Because so many of our detractors are allied with the animal welfare or animal rights movements, zoo and aquarium executives are more comfortable with the terminology “animal care”. In contrast, two North American zoos, Brookfield and Detroit, have raised the profile of welfare by founding dedicated centers. The Detroit and Brookfield centers are facilitating collaboration through sponsored workshops and symposia. By hosting these important gatheringss, zoo biologists have been introduced to the science and practice of zoo animal welfare and its many manifestations. Increasingly, the format of these meetings offers opportunities for zoo professionals to interact with responsible representatives of animal welfare organizations. Initially explored at the Atlanta meeting that culminated in the benchmark Smithsonian publication Ethics on the Ark [Norton et al., 1995], the Detroit-Brookfield meetings have reactivated our détente with the humane movement.

In a new book, Maple and Perdue [2013] characterized wellness as a synonym for welfare but without the negative connotations. Nested in the domain of animal welfare, veterinary medicine, and the behavioral sciences, the philosophy and practice of wellness is an alternative concept for zoos and aquariums committed to achieving optimal animal welfare. Given the strong interest in wellness among the general public, its utility for corporate, school and university programs, and its market value to purveyors of health, nutrition, and fitness products, zoos may be the ideal venue for a comprehensive and family-friendly wellness experience. After experimenting with wildlife wellness initiatives in three American zoos in California, Georgia, and Florida, we have found it to be a highly adaptable construct with appeal to all stakeholders.

Beginning in November 2011, we have been working to implement a comprehensive wildlife wellness initiative at the San Francisco Zoo. Wellness has been positioned as an operational driver to inform exhibit and facilities design, and a paradigm for enlarging the domain of health and wellness throughout the organization. This initiative builds on a well-established institutional commitment to environmental enrichment inspired by the ideas of Hal Markowitz more than three decades ago [Markowitz, 2012, Markowitz, 1982]. The zoo's veterinary program has been especially proactive in utilizing training and technology to monitor wellness in a diversity of animals. In San Francisco, the pregnancies of Sumatran tigers (Panthera tigris sumatrae) and fishing cats (Prionailurus viverrinus) have been evaluated successfully through ultrasound and x-ray technology in fully awake, cooperative subjects. San Francisco's holistic approach to managing the nocturnal Aye-Aye (Daubentonia madagascariensis) has provided access to the full moon light cycle to facilitate wellness and reproduction in this delicate species. Training through operant conditioning has proved to be an essential tool to monitor health and wellness in the entire zoo population.

To facilitate the development of the San Francisco wellness initiative and to advance the priority of evidence-based management, the board of directors committed funds for a unique “Professor-in-Residence” position. In this engagement, supported by the Stanton Family Foundation, the senior author is working with management and frontline staff to develop protocols and standards for achieving wellness, attract wellness interns from regional colleges, universities, and medical centers, and establish protocols for an empirical workplace. Visiting Professors are a cost-effective alternative to full-time staff positions, and generally provide access to a cadre of talented student collaborators. As an extension of these academic partnerships, the San Francisco Zoo plans to host a west coast workshop on wildlife wellness to further explore findings, innovations, and opportunities in the emerging field. This meeting is expected to build on the recent success of animal welfare gatherings in Detroit and Chicago with the specific goal of enlarging the critical mass of zoos committed to animal welfare.

Wellness is universally understood as a balance of mind, body, and spirit that results in an overall feeling of well-being. This idea finds expression in the constant, conscious human pursuit of living life to its full potential. Dunn [1961] offered the first formal definition of wellness as “an integrated method of functioning…. oriented toward maximizing the potential of which the individual is capable”. The wellness lifestyle has been expanded to include “a self-defined balance of health habits such as adequate sleep and rest, productivity, exercise, participation in meaningful activity, nutrition, social contact, and supporting relationships” [Weir (2011), Swarbrick, 2010]. Interestingly, many wellness practices for people are targeted to the control of obesity and inactivity, both of which are side-effects of affluence in human populations. To prevent obesity in the zoo we have to monitor and control activity and diet, but we've learned that diet alone is not sufficient to produce animals that are healthy and well. In the psychological realm, wellness equates to physical fitness, and fitness is an important outcome for a program of preventive medicine.

In nature, fitness facilitates survival. To combat boredom and lethargy, animals in the zoo must be activated by training, and activity must be scheduled daily by attentive zoo keepers. A lack of regular exercise may be a primary reason that so many zoo animals develop heart disease [Cousins, 1979]. Captive lowland gorillas (Gorilla gorilla gorilla) have been diagnosed with heart disease in early adulthood, and concerned zoo veterinarians and consulting human cardiac specialists are collaborating to determine the cause and identify preventive medicines and procedures. Although they are capable of living into their fifties, many male gorillas have died in their early twenties. The iconic silverback Massa died at the age of 54 at the Philadelphia Zoo in 1984. Jenny, a female at Dallas Zoo, reached the age of 55. However, a male at the Cleveland Zoo, Brooks, died from heart disease at the age of 21, and another male, 23 year old, Kuja, died on the operating table at the National Zoo. From a study of 74 lowland gorilla deaths in North American zoos [Meehan and Lowenstine, 1994], 41% were due to heart disease, primarily a medical condition known as “fibrosing cardiomyopathy”.

Diet is carefully controlled in virtually every accredited zoo and aquarium. Daily nutritional modifications are feasible now that our institutions are hiring doctoral level nutritionists. Some 20 of the 200 plus accredited North American zoos and aquariums currently employ full-time staff nutritionists, and many others have hired nutritional consultants to monitor their diets. The growing interest in captive gorilla health and wellness will require continuing field studies of wild gorillas to learn more about their general fitness in nature. In recent years field biologists have discovered that lowland gorillas eat more fruit than previously documented, and gorillas have been observed foraging for plants growing in the swampy regions of West Africa [Nishihara, 1992; Tutin and Fernandez, 1993; Popovich and Dierenfeld, 1997]. One of these plants, Aframomum, a member of the ginger family, is a powerful natural medicine with antibacterial, antiviral, antifungal, and anti-inflammatory properties.

Optimal wellness cannot be achieved if zoo animals remain sedentary. We know that inactivity can produce serious consequences for people and animals. Because obese elephants experience difficult pregnancies and often require human intervention to deliver, it is important to keep them fit. Authorities in the South Indian state of Tamil Nadu revealed recently that many of the Asian elephants (Elephas maximus) kept in temples are obese due to a history of inactivity [Parameswaren, 2012]. In the wild, the need for food and water motivates elephants to move and explore. If food and water is delivered on a rigid schedule, the elephant's motivation to actively search is blunted. To stimulate activity at the Oregon Zoo, keepers train elephants to jog for multiple 20 min sessions daily. The elephants also lift and push logs, and swim in their pool as directed by their keepers. Both diet and exercise are essential components in regimes designed to improve the outcome of an elephant's 22 months of pregnancy, maintain optimal body weights, and promote overall vitality.

Many scientists regard welfare as equivalent to psychological well-being. Mason has used the terms interchangeably [e.g., Mason and Veasey, 2010]. Human health guru Deepak Chopra operates a center for well-being where world standards are monitored, nation by nation. Chopra uses the term “thriving” to describe optimal well-being in human populations, and “suffering” to describe its polar opposite. Because the concept of wellness has been deployed so effectively in medicine, especially nursing, and veterinary medicine, it encompasses both welfare and well-being. If we can engineer the living environment and develop husbandry techniques that produce healthy, active, fit, and well zoo animals, we will achieve the outcome of acceptable or even optimal welfare.

Wildlife wellness requires an active partnership between practitioners of zoo medicine and animal care and husbandry. Zoo keepers, trainers, and medical technicians should operate as a cohesive team on the frontlines of wellness. Distinguished from the term “health,” the term “wellness” shifts attention from illness to a state of well-being and its ongoing development. If we understand the key variables that influence locomotion, attention, consumption, play, socialization, cognition, and reproduction, we can manipulate and monitor species-typical behavior to evaluate wellness. A pioneer in the field of human wellness, Hettler [1980] proposed a six factor model including spiritual, physical, emotional, social, occupational, and intellectual elements. Each of these factors, with the exception of the spiritual element, can be easily applied to nonhuman species. His model is reminiscent of the work of Abraham Maslow [1962] who formulated the concept of self-actualization, and parallels the emerging field of positive psychology [Seligman and Czikszentmilhalyi, 2000]. A fundamental difference in welfare and wellness is the historical connection of welfare with objections to animal suffering in agricultural, biomedical, and zoo settings. Wellness, on the other hand, derives from the effort to reach a higher plane of satisfaction, essentially techniques to improve the quality of life from good to great.

Zoo and aquarium veterinarians routinely conduct wellness exams to determine an animal's total condition. To conduct wellness exams, facilities must be engineered to encourage evaluation. Enclosures must be designed or retrofit with appropriate scales, squeeze devices, or capture chutes, so animals, regardless of their size or complexity, can be easily trained to accept non-invasive medical procedures. Training animals to cooperate for blood pressure readings and venipuncture without anesthesia is now an acknowledged best practice in progressive institutions. New metrics to evaluate behavioral deficiencies have been developed for ease of application by animal staff [Desmond and Laule (1992), Maple (2007), Maple and Perdue, 2013].

A commitment to wellness may be a quicker, less contentious path to promoting and implementing animal welfare in zoos and aquariums. Both wellness and welfare are core values that support environmental and programmatic enhancements to improve the living standards of zoo and aquarium animals. Simply stated, a wellness strategy provides encouragement to improve care in every domain and dimension, but particularly the workplace performance of key personnel responsible for the wellness of each and every animal in the zoo. To this end, tasks associated with a wellness strategy may become more important than the traditional chores of zoo keepers.

With greater awareness of the priority and urgency of high standards and best practices in wellness/welfare, the allocation of funding for these purposes and the operating units that support them should steadily grow to meet the public demand for superior animal facilities and protocols.