What is a Pet Evaluation Matrix?
2009
How is your shelter doing in its lifesaving mission? How many healthy, treatable, or unhealthy & untreatable animals are being saved? And how does that number compare to other organizations in your area, or in other parts of the country?
Useful information indeed for anyone running a shelter or animal control program, but it's not just shelter managers who'd like the answers. Donors, volunteers, public officials and the media often ask those kinds of questions, too. But how can you know, when answering them about your own organization, that everyone else means the same thing when it comes to terms like "treatable" or "unhealthy & untreatable" animals?
The Asilomar Accords Reporting System
The Asilomar Accords provide shelters with standardized definitions, tables and formulas that level the playing field when it comes to that information. Intake and outcome of dogs and cats through the shelter system are tracked. Animals are categorized in a standardized way, allowing shelters to allocate their resources more effectively. A consistent definition for a shelter's "live release rate" enables "apples to apples" data comparison.
The Pet Evaluation Matrix is also a component of that system. It gives more specificity to Asilomar Accords definitions based on a community standard of care, compares shelter lifesaving to that of pet guardians in the community, and provides more confidence to community stakeholders, enabling everyone to have a better understanding of their shelter/community's lifesaving progress and compare it to others.
What does a Pet Evaluation Matrix (PEM) look like?
A PEM consists of a list of specific, more commonly seen medical and behavioral conditions that may occur in individual sheltered animals. These conditions may vary depending on the region and shelter. Each shelter animal's medical and behavioral status is evaluated and they are slotted in one of four Asilomar Accords categories:
- Healthy
- Treatable-Rehabilitatable
- Treatable-Manageable
- Unhealthy & Untreatable
Examples of how conditions are matched to categories
A shelter veterinarian identifies a cat as FIV without clinical signs. Should the shelter categorize this cat as treatable-manageable or as unhealthy & untreatable? This is where the matrix comes into play, making the determination by using a community standard of care. In County A, the majority of pet guardians said that if their cat had this condition, they would provide ongoing support and not euthanize their cat. Thus, in County A, this cat is categorized as treatable-manageable. The answer may be different in other communities.
The definitions of treatable-rehabilitatable and treatable-manageable refer to the standard of care "typically provided by reasonable and caring pet guardians in the community." There is nothing in the definition of "treatable" that says a shelter has to be able to provide treatment in order for an animal to be categorized as "treatable." In other words, whether an animal meets the "treatable" definition does not depend on whether a shelter actually has the resources to treat the animal. A dog with kennel cough meets the definition as long as reasonable and caring pet guardians in the community would typically treat their own dogs for the disease. The fact that a shelter may not have a medical clinic or veterinarian, is overcrowded or can't afford to provide treatment, is not a factor in determining whether the animal meets the definition.
In addition, the community standard of care is not the same as the most advanced care that might be provided by veterinary or behavior science. No doubt there are animals who could be saved by the latest advances in these sciences, but if such care is not "typically provided" by pet guardians in the community, these animals do not fall within the "treatable" definition. In other words, "treatable," as defined in the Asilomar Accords, is not the same thing as "savable."
If an animal is categorized as "unhealthy & untreatable," this does not mean the animal can't be saved. Nothing in the Asilomar Accords definitions prevents shelters from providing care beyond that typically provided by pet guardians in their community. Animals categorized as "unhealthy and untreatable" due to serious behavior issues like dog to human aggression, for instance, may be placed in sanctuaries or other appropriate long-term care facilities, if available. Similarly, extensive medical intervention, foster care, and other treatment may be provided to rehabilitate seriously sick and injured animals so they too can be placed in loving homes.
Measuring Instruments
The Asilomar Accords enable shelters to determine their live release rate and helps them figure out how they might allocate resources to boost their live release rate. If a high percentage of shelter deaths are healthy animals, more focus may need to go to adoption programs. If the majority of deaths are treatable, more time and money may need to be allocated to medical and behavioral intervention.
