Medical Response Dogs
Medical response dogs are also called service dogs. Medical response dogs work with a broad range of people and perform a wide range of duties including turning light switches on and off, fetching help from another family member or neighbor, or pressing a life-line button to alert people about the owner's state. These dogs work in partnership with disabled people.
Under the umbrella terms of medical response dogs and service dogs are seizure response dogs. These dogs have been trained to react when a person with epilepsy is having a seizure. They may bark to notify a neighbor or lie down next to the owner to prevent him from harm.
They are also taught to move dangerous objects away from the owner, and even revive the owner if the person loses consciousness. These service dogs are trained to alert a person right before a seizure is about to occur as well.
Fact
Researchers at the University of Florida conducted a survey whose findings indicate that 10 percent of epileptic patients with service dogs were alerted by their dogs right before a seizure was about to happen. These patients could then take necessary precautions to prevent or minimize those seizures. These researchers believe that the dogs detected subtle changes in body chemistry or behavior in their owner.
Service dogs also assist people with psychiatric conditions such as bipolar disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, autism, schizophrenia, and anxiety disorders. The dogs are taught how to recognize warning signs, such as changes in an owner's behavior. Dogs also remind their owners to take their medications.
Dogs are even being trained to detect different forms of cancer — from skin melanomas to prostate cancer. At the Sensory Research Institute at Florida State University, researchers are training dogs to sniff out different forms of cancer. Two dogs, Daisy and Tangle, were taught how to detect the unique odor of bladder cancer cells in urine samples.
At the Pine Street Foundation in Northern California, dogs had a 97 percent accuracy rate in detecting lung cancer in patients. They had an 88 percent accuracy rate in finding breast cancer among patients. They were able to do this by smelling the breath of each patient.
Training service dogs is similar to training Seeing Eye dogs. It's best to start by researching various dog-training organizations that have assistance training divisions. One good place to look is the American Dog Trainers Network, which has a link on its website for Service and Assistance Dogs. The site lists service organizations in most states.
Opportunities are growing in this field because people with disabilities want to be as independent as possible. They are relying on working with their dogs to be able to work outside of their homes, support themselves, and take care of themselves.
