IF IT WORKS WITH HUMANS, WHY NOT PETS?

The latest trend among pet owners anxious about the health of their animals is taking them to see a chiropractor—sometimes their own. San Diego yoga instructor Dee Hayes has shared her chiropractor with her cocker spaniel for six years. “If it’s good enough for us, why not them?” she tells The New York Times. Options for Animals, a school that trains veterinarians and chiropractors how to adjust the joints of animals, has increased its enrollment by 50 percent over the past few years, and many experts promote chiropractic as an inexpensive and effective way to treat animals for arthritis, joint pain, and sprains and other injuries. But veterinarians warn that there is no scientific proof that the practice is safe or effective for animals. “Chiropractic methods potentially can cause injury through the use of inappropriate technique or excessive force,” says the American Animal Hospital Association. Some pet owners insist that chiropractors have helped their pets. Mary Arabe took her cat to a chiropractor when he developed a painful limp. “The next day he was walking fine,” Arabe says. “It worked. He healed him.”