Facts about Service Dogs for Physical and Mental Disability Assistance
We’ve been looking at the different types of jobs dogs can do during our Working Dogs series. First, we took a look at a brief overview of The Difference Between Service Dogs, Therapy Dogs, and Emotional Support Animals. Then we dived a little deeper into What are Emotional Support Dogs and how Therapy work is Rewarding for Dogs and People.
Now we’ll journey into service dogs and how they help their humans navigate their environment.
Service Dogs
We know that dogs can perform many tasks in police and military jobs, or in search and rescue. But dogs also can be trained for a specific individual’s needs. I think we can all remember a time we saw a pup in a store or a restaurant wearing that iconic service dog vest that says, “Please don’t touch me; I’m working.”
But what exactly is the role of a service dog?
Service dogs assist people with a disability to perform a specific task. According to the ADA, these disabilities can be physical, sensory, psychiatric, intellectual, or other mental disabilities. The list of roles these dogs can fill is endless, but a few examples are:
- Seeing-eye dogs. These pups help people who are blind to negotiate their environment safely.
- Hearing dogs. These pups help the hearing impaired to be alert to sounds in their environment.
- Diabetic Dogs. These dogs can sense when a person’s blood sugar is too high or low and alert them to take the appropriate action.
- Seizure dogs. These dogs can detect when a person with epilepsy is about to have a seizure and alert their handler to get into a safe place for the episode to occur. These dogs can also be trained to get help in the event of a seizure.
- Service dogs for the disabled. These pups can help their humans complete daily tasks like opening doors, carrying items, or fetching objects. They also can alert others when their handlers need help.
- Autism Awareness Dog. These dogs help children with Autism self-regulate, reduce wandering away, reduce repetitive behaviors, and help calm meltdowns.
Service dogs go through extensive training to learn their job.
Service dog roles are not limited to breed or size, although certain breeds are better suited for some jobs due to their genetic traits. For example, a mobility support dog should be large enough to bear the weight of the person it’s helping.
The most important training a service dog will learn is to perform their specific task for their handler. These tasks can include many things, such as:
- Detecting a medical emergency and alerting their handler
- Providing tactile stimulation during a panic attack
- Reminding a handler to take medication
It’s also important that these dogs have extensive training in public spaces to ensure socialization and diminished distractions to various stimulation. They should be able to ignore dogs, people, food on the ground, sounds and so forth and only focus on safely helping their human.
Where can a service dog go?
The ADA recognizes a service dog’s role and therefore has the right to go anywhere a person can go, even restaurants and airplanes.
Surprisingly, right now, a service dog doesn’t need to be certified as such once training has been completed. Although not required, it is recommended that a service dog is identified in some way to alert others of this special pup’s role. The most common method of identification is wearing a vest that says “service dog” on it. However, many industries and states are debating a formal certification to prevent the use of “false service dogs” since lots of people abuse the vest.
When going into an establishment that doesn’t otherwise allow animals, the staff can only ask two questions about the service dog.
- Is the dog required because of a disability?
- What task has the dog been trained to perform?
When you have a service dog at your side, it’s always good to be familiar with these dogs’ rights in case his presence is ever questioned.
To learn more about service dogs’ rights, visit the ADA’s website for Frequently Asked Questions.
Do you have an amazing service dog at your side? Share with us a picture of you and your faithful pup on Instagram @sitmeanssitpgh or Facebook @SitMeansSitPittsburgh.