Small animals may seem weird to use in therapy, but they help in a different way. These “small animals” include rabbits, gerbils, hamsters, birds and even fish. You will see many of these animals used in the school classroom or a therapist’s room. They are easy to care for and no training is required. The rabbits, gerbils, and hamsters are great because they can be kept in a smaller cage. The birds need a bigger cage for room to fly and move around in, but they are still easy to care for and a great learning opportunity for the children. Fish, as we all know, must be kept in clean water in a fish bowl or tank. Small animals help to teach responsibility to young children, making them popular in the schools. Requirements are slim for these small …show more content…
Animal therapy is the same way. Depression can strike hard on anyone at any time. Veterans can be affected in different ways of depression (Chandler). Children of military families find comfort in a pet, for the pet will always be there to listen to their troubles (Rovner). As well as veterans, college students experience depression from the big changes and leaving family behind (Chandler). Having the animal there to comfort you or trust you can bring out the shine in someone’s eyes again. When life brings bad times into the lives of patients it’s hard to find motivation. Having an animal to take of or walk is a great way to increase their motivation to get out and exercise. For the elderly that are in homes, they are limited as to what they are allowed to do. When a dog is there to play with, a cat is there to cuddle, or a horse is needs to be groomed, the self-esteem of the patients increase greatly (Chandler). Self-esteem can decrease fast for anyone. That’s why animals are used in therapy, they can’t tell what age you are, what your disability is, or what you look like. Children that are neglected or abused are touched by pets because the pet will love them no matter what (Rovner). Patients that are undergoing chemo or have undergone chemo suffer from anxiety in many ways. Children under any treatments will be scared for life with anxiety. The sense of an animal there loving them or needing them to walk or groom gives the patient a light at the end of the tunnel (Chandler). A hospital is a stressful place for anyone of any age, animal therapy calms the nerves, whether it is in the waiting room or the recovery room. The small animals help with behavior problems for children in the schools and at home (Jones). Animal therapy is a huge help with developmental disorders and emotional disorders. People with developmental disorders will sometimes be ignored, an animal will never ignore them. The
Some medical professionals do not believe that mental health patients can benefit from therapy dogs and go as far as saying it is a risk far as to say that it is a to the patient and compromise the patients ability to take care of the dog. When people who suffer with mental health issues qualify to get a therapy dog. The mental health patient is tested to see if they are capable of taking care of the dog. Those in need of assistance should use therapy dogs frequently do to the part of the benefits to using these pets to improve mental and emotional health as and physical health. Therapy dogs are beneficial to people who suffer from mental health issues by providing companionship as well as support. Some people with mental health issues have a hard time trusting others and need someone to talk to; Service dogs are important because to make they people with mental health problems feel better and help people with these disorders deal with their emotions.
There are many advantages to having a dog as a pet to help mental health. When one does not want to get up and face the day a dog can usually make them happy with their unconditional love and their need for the owner’s attention. A person’s mood is lifted when they go outside to play with their dog since the sun and fresh air wakes them up and makes them a little happier. The sun also has Vitamin D that helps with some mental and physical health issues such as; Depression, cancer, obesity, heart attacks. When one goes outside they are in nature and looking around and being in nature usually makes them calm. Taking a pet dog for a walk gets one up and about. Someone who takes their pet dog for walks gets them into a routine of going for walks or runs and it keeps them physically healthy. This also makes them
In 1961, Dr. Boris Levinson, a child psychologist, became the “accidental” pioneer for animal therapy. One day he left his dog, Jingles, alone with one of his young, uncommunicative patients. When Dr. Levinson came back, the child was smiling and talking to the dog (Altschiller 3). This just shows how quick and monumental the effect of an animal can be. He believed that therapy animals provided, “unconditional acceptance and love” and they offered “a secure and warm environment for children and other patients, increasing their ability to adapt better psychologically to other people”...
AAT is still a fairly new type of therapy but since one of the jobs of the animals is to provide affection and comfort a therapy animal is usually found in retirement homes, nursing homes, schools, hospices, disaster effected areas, hospitals and in places with people who have learning difficulties (GoodTherapy). Animal therapy takes advantage of the natural bond between ad animal and a human, therapists believe that when using animals there are significant emotional and transformation changes (GoodTherapy). Patients who are involved with AAT see physical improvements in their health such as: decreased stress levels, reduced anger and aggression, decreased hostility towards themselves and others, improved social skills, decreased heart rate and normal blood pressure levels, increase in endorphins, improved self-esteem, trust, patience and a sense of empowerment (GoodTherapy). Animal therapy will also be seen a lot with kids because often times they have a harder time trying to express their feelings or make connections with adults but they can connect with an animal. Therapy animals can teach a child patience, respect, empathy, acceptance, confidence, assertiveness and responsibility. No matter the age of the person who works with the therapy animals they know that no matter what happens they won’t be judged only be loved unconditionally and that’s something they don’t always feel from human therapists
Research has been done in the area of human-animal companionship and security, and stress management. Due to the relative newness of this field and the difficulties in studying it, most research has been concentrated on the elderly, specifically, institutionalized elderly. Pets have been introduced into these settings in order to minimize the negative consequences of institutionalization. Most research has been conducted on the extreme ends of the continuum, either very brief visitation or therapy of resident pets studies (Wrinkler 216).
In the article “Therapy Dogs Work Miracles. But Do They Like There Job?” by Linda Lombardi. Linda shows that when sevices dog are not stressed out when they are working. Linda worked with many scientist and sciences clients. She worked with “Applied Animal Behaviour Sciences”, the Animal Behaviour did some reacher and found that dogs are not stressed out when they are working. They scientists state this “therapy dogs in pediatric cancer wards are not stressed by their work”(Lombardi). The scientist along with Linda show that dogs are not stressed out when they are working with kids. Dogs are probably not stressed when working with kids because they are active and are up and around with children. In the end of the article Linda states that
In the field of therapy, there are numerous of therapy available out there for different type of individuals and situations as well. There is one type of therapy that usually contains people and animal, it is animal-assisted therapy is a therapeutic approach that brings animals and individuals with physical and/or emotional needs together to perform the therapy. Animal-assisted therapy tend to be focused on individuals either children or elderly for them to be able to connect with the animal thus feeling comfortable talking with the therapist. Pet therapy works for all ages, whether sick or not (Lanchnit, 2011). Although, this paper, most of the focus is on animal-assisted therapy towards children using dogs.
Due to pets having such a positive impact on overall health of people, animal assisted therapy (AAT) has been a growing field. Currently, Mayo Clinic has 28 certified therapy animals, on a volunteer basis, with the demand for AAT visits from physicians and patients increasing. To help grow the animal assisted therapy program, recruit more volunteers, and serve the patient’s needs first; we need to make the AAT program more well-known in the community. By expanding the AAT program and making it more robust, Mayo Clinic has the potential to set the standards for a quality AAT program in a hospital setting, but to also help patients have a more positive experience and a shorter stay while in the hospital.
Animal integrated therapy has been defined as “using animals within a goal oriented setting to implement treatment”, which has shown to help cognitively, psychologically, and socially to great extent (Fine, 2006).
Eye contact was reduced most significantly between the therapist and the child when the dog was in the room. Eye contact was between the child and the therapy dog during those sessions. The children were more likely to give treats to the therapy dog than the stuffed dog as well as laughed more. Regarding verbal interaction, the children were found to give less in-depth answers when they were in the therapy room with the dog. The children were more focused on the dog rather than talking to the therapist or talking about themselves.
Benefits of Pet-assisted activity Animals can make excellent therapists. The benefits of comfort animals have been recognized for decades. In order to show the practicality of AAA, this session explains these benefits with analyzing its application in university. The presence of pet animals like dogs and cats can have anti-arousal physiological effects on college students. Furthermore, pet animals can act as a social support of students who have pets at home or have a strong affection to animals to deliver positive attitude and emotionally support them in a stressful time.
People with dogs are less likely to suffer from depression and anxiety disorders. Dogs are great social support for people with limited social interaction, such as someone who is incredibly busy with work or other activities. Many people talk to their dogs in a similar fashion to the way they talk to themselves. Daily struggles and frustrations are often vented to pets, which can serve as a release for these emotions. Having a confidant that not only provides unconditional love and positive energy, but serves as a frustration vent is incredibly valuable, and makes the moments of vulnerability easy.