An Introduction To Guide Dogs & Service Dogs

These days, it is hard to go to a public place like a store, airport, or mall without seeing someone with a service dog. These caring, attentive dogs assist their owners with many different tasks, helping them deal with a range of different physical and mental conditions that affect their health.

For instance, service dogs are often assigned to kids with peanut allergies. The dogs are trained to detect whether or not an item has been contaminated by peanuts before the child comes in contact with it. Service dogs are also used for helping people who suffer from seizures caused by epilepsy. During a seizure, they provide essential assistance that can literally save the life of their owner.

September has been designated as National Assistance Dog Month. Because of that, it is the perfect time to discuss everything from the training that these dogs undergo to the process of matching them up with an owner.

The Selection Process For Service Dogs

Not all dogs have the personality or temperament required to be a service dog. Along with evaluating the overall disposition of the dog, there are other requirements that trainers use to find qualified guide dogs including the following:

Easy to train. Dogs who are selected to become service animals are extremely responsive to training. This involves far more than just learning how to sit or stay. It also involves learning how to ignore nearby distractions, staying completely focused on helping their owner. This is vital since service dogs are often used in public locations where there are a lot of distractions.

Well-socialized. Dogs that are high-strung or that startle easily are not good candidates for becoming service dogs. Instead, the dogs that go on to be trained for these programs are the ones that are extremely calm and that don’t respond fearfully to situations around them.

The ability to learn complex tasks. Guide dogs and service dogs are often responsible for performing extremely complex tasks when assisting their owner. For instance, they may be asked to bring water, clothing, or shoes to their owner. This requires them to be able to discern between different items. They also may be asked to provide alerts for certain situations, letting their owner know that there is a problem. Only the most intelligent, most easily trainable dogs are suitable for these types of tasks.

The Training Process

Service dogs undergo a tremendous amount of training. Most often, this training occurs in public settings. The goal of the training is to teach the dog how to stay focused, even when they are in environments that are noisy, crowded, or unfamiliar.

During training, the dogs are taught to avoid interacting with the people or animals that they come in contact with. Not only are they trained not to bark but they also learn not to beg for food or jump up on people. Ultimately, the goal is to help them stay calm while remaining alert to what is happening around them.

The Service Dog Adoption Process

Service dogs are available for many different health conditions. If you or someone you know could benefit from working with one of these animals, there are a number of different groups that you can reach out to.

• Canine Assistants. This group works with people who suffer from a wide range of health conditions to help them find a reliable service dog. Oftentimes, the people that they help are seniors.
• Dogs For Diabetes. The service dogs provided by this organization are specially trained to alert diabetics to problems with their blood sugar levels, helping them avoid potentially deadly situations.
• Dogs for Better Lives. This group connects people with hearing problems or autism with service animals.
• America’s Vet Dogs. PTSD can be debilitating. It affects first responders, veterans, and other people who are exposed to extreme situations. This group trains dogs to provide companionship and assistance to people who suffer from PTSD.
• The Seeing Eye. This group assists vision-impaired people by pairing them up with seeing-eye dogs.

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