What is a Service Dog? The Dog Guys Explain
From the Daily Press - Q: In one of your columns, you mentioned someone bringing a small dog into a casino in a stroller. I have a dog myself, but that’s ridiculous. Dogs don’t belong in casinos. Last week, at a casino restaurant, I noticed a woman with a dog. The staff told me it was a service dog. However, the woman looked totally fine to me; she could see and she could walk. She was doting on the little dog, who was obviously there because it was spoiled. I asked the woman about the dog and she only snapped, “It’s none of your business.” Clearly, her act was a sham. Dogs shouldn’t be in restaurants unless they’re helping the blind. — S.C., Las Vegas, NV
A: While you may see well, you’re clearly blind about the uses of service dogs. Read the rest of this entry »
Sep 27 Service dog program needs raisers Service Dogs In the Media 4 CommentsSusquehanna Service Dogs (SSD) needs Puppy Raisers for Labrador retriever puppies that will grow and be trained to become service or hearing dogs to support adults and children with disabilities.
Puppy Raisers are volunteers who raise these “service-dogs-to-be” from the age of eight weeks, preparing them for advanced training at 15 to 18 months. Puppy Raisers provide a safe and loving environment, healthy routines, basic training and socialization opportunities. Of course all of this is done under the guidance of a trainer.
Puppy Raisers attend 2 to 4 training sessions per month in the Harrisburg area. Training includes instruction classes, lectures and outings to various public arenas.
Sep 18 Service dog program gets national award Service Dogs In the Media 20 Comments
Carolina Canines
A press release last week also noted the competition was sponsored by Newman’s Own, Fisher House Foundation and Military Times Media Group. Dating to its roots in 2000, the competition has recognized 125 programs with nearly $600,000.
Carolina Canines for Veterans was launched in 2008 in a national pilot program to assist wounded warriors and provide them with service dogs, trained by military prisoners at Camp Lejeune, after being rescued from local shelters.
The canines are provided at no cost to the wounded vets.
Sep 17 Family, School Battle Over Autistic Boy’s Dog Service Dogs In the Media 57 Comments
Carter Kalbfleisch poses with his service dog, Corbin. Carter's family is now fighting for Corbin to be able to attend public school with the 5-year-old autistic boy.
Columbia, Ill. — The Kalbfleisch family, of Columbia, Ill., had tried every remedy in the book to treat their son, Carter, 5, who was diagnosed as autistic when he was a toddler.
“We just kept on missing milestone after milestone,” Melissa Kalbfleisch, Carter’s mother, told Zootoo Pet News. “He wasn’t getting any better.”
The family had tried therapy and a special gluten-free diet — which had the reverse effect and made Carter ill — seemingly, nothing was working.
That is, until Corbin, a 1-year-old service dog, joined the family in mid-July. Since then, Carter’s tantrums have lessened and he has more comfortable in large, social places. He articulated his first words — including commands directed at Corbin — just last month. Read the rest of this entry »
Sep 9 PTSD treatment: Military goes to the dogs to help soldiers Service Dogs In the Media 1,901 CommentsDefense Department to study unusual aid for PTSD sufferers
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Can a canine companion soothe the volatile emotions of a soldier haunted by post-traumatic stress disorder? It may sound far-fetched, but the Department of Defense wants to find out. It is spending millions of dollars on medical research projects like this that may yield groundbreaking results but are too speculative for other government agencies to consider.
So the Defense Department is financing a $300,000 study that will pair soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan with dogs trained to sense when their masters are about to have a panic attack and give them a calming nudge or nuzzle. These psychiatric service dogs have been assisting people with mental illnesses since the late 1990s. About 10,000 such dogs are now in use. Read the rest of this entry »
Sep 9 Yonkers diabetic boy’s dog blocked at school doors Service Dogs In the Media 44 Comments
Samantha Spataro speaks with Yonkers police outside the Paideia School 15 in Yonkers Sept. 8, 2009. Her son Anthony, who has diabetes, was sitting outside the school after he was not allowed in with his service dog Dash for the first day of school on Sept. 8, 2009.
YONKERS – School officials blocked a diabetic boy from bringing his dog into school this morning, continuing a dispute between his family and the district.
Anthony Spataro, 8 and his mother Samantha Spataro tried to bring Dash, a black male labrador, into Paideia School 15 at 175 Westchester Ave., but the district’s executive director for pupil support services and special education Donna Martuge intercepted them.
Samantha Spataro said that Martuge told her that Anthony was welcome into the school to start the fourth grade, but he could not bring in the dog.
Sep 8 Canine reports for duty at Kane’ohe base Service Dogs In the Media 17 Comments
Marine Staff Sgt. Karlo Salgado gets to know Finn at the Kane'ohe base.
KANE’OHE — Marine Corps Base Hawaii’s latest recruit breaks the mold with his laid-back attitude and nonregulation hairstyle. But he’s highly trained and devoted to his unit.
Pressed into service about a month ago, Finn, a yellow Labrador retriever, is stationed at the Wounded Warrior Battalion at the Kane’ohe base. His duty is simple — bring joy to the people around him — but his ability to carry it out took two years of rigorous training that’s expected of any Marine.
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Vietnam veteran Bill Callahan talking to his service dog Tailor outside his home in Baytown, Texas. Callahan, a paraplegic, is working to get service dogs like Tailor for other injured servicemen. (AP Photo/Pat Sullivan)
HOUSTON — The drone of helicopters still haunts William Callahan decades after Vietnam combat left him paralyzed, but he said government bureaucracy stood in the way of getting the one thing that made the echoes stop and kept him independent: a service dog.
It took four years and giving up on a Veteran’s Affairs canine program for Callahan to find Taylor, a specially trained Labrador retriever.
Although the canine program’s Web site touts that it “routinely” gives veterans service dogs, the program’s director Neil Eckrich said only two dogs have been paired with veterans since Congress authorized the program in 2001. Eckrich acknowledged there were difficulties with the program, including the time it took to conduct studies on the dogs’ benefits and problems promoting the service.
Sep 3 Putting Puppies Behind Bars (For A Good Cause) Service Dogs In the Media 1,275 Comments
Samba, a black Lab trained in the Puppies Behind Bars program, was trained as a companion animal and has worked with combat veteran Paul Bang-Knudsen (below) since February 2009. They visited Washington, D.C., earlier this year.
Gloria Gilbert Stoga is the founder of Puppies Behind Bars, a canine training program that partners puppies with prison inmates. At the end of their training, the dogs are placed in the outside world, either as bomb-sniffing animals or as service dogs, providing daily assistance to wounded veterans.
Stoga explains to Dave Davies, senior writer for the Philadelphia Daily News, that the dogs’ training path relies largely on their personalities.
“The bomb-sniffing dog is the dog who is going to be more out front, who’s going to make decisions” says Stoga. “The service dog is the dog that’s going to constantly look up at the owner and the handler and say what do you want me to do now?” Read the rest of this entry »
Sep 3 Service Dogs Help Traumatized Veterans Heal Service Dogs In the Media 720 CommentsIraq war veteran Jennifer Pacanowski was unaware that she was racing dangerously down the freeway at 85 miles an hour when she felt a wet nose nudge her elbow.
She immediately slowed down.
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