Psychiatric Service Dog (PSD)

Lastly, there is the service dog. These dogs help to assist all other disabled individuals and their exact job varies upon their handler’s problems. One type of service dog is the Psychiatric Service Dog, or PSD. A PSD is trained to assist people with an emotional or psychiatric disability. This dog assist with detecting the onset of a psychiatric episode and help to lessen their effects. They can bring their handlers medicine, provide safety checks or room searches, turn on/off lights, interrupt self mutilations, and keep disoriented individuals from danger. In order for a person to obtain a PSD they must be prescribed by the person’s licensed therapist in a properly formatted letter clearly stating their immediate need for a PSD.
Many people
The SSigDog is a sensory signal/social signal dog. These service animals help to assist people with autism. Their job is to help calm and ground an individual on autism spectrum by tactile or deep pressure stimulation. They can also assist in teaching life skills, maintaining boundaries, or finding a “runner”. Also they alert the handler to distracting repetitive movements that are common to autistic people such as hand waving. This allows the handler to stop this movement and resume normal human activities. These dogs usually help younger children and can be required to carry emergency protocol and contact information if their handler in non-verbal. The Seizure Response dog is trained to assist people with seizures. These dogs are highly trained and some can even sense a seizure coming on. Although the dogs cannot be trained to sense a seizure, this is only found in some cases due to association with their human partner and an intuitive nature. This dog will then warn their handler and guide them to sit down or to a safe place. Once the person is undergoing their seizure the dogs are trained to get help, to stand guard over their handler, and to call 911. Also this dog can retrieve medication and utilize deep pressure stimulation to end a seizure early.
Another common known service dog is the Medical Alert Dogs or MADs. A MAD helps alert their handler to dangerous physiological changes. These changes can
In order to work in this specific area the animals are required to be registered with the ADA. They are also required to be well tempered, not shed excessively, be well socialized, exposed to many environments, and to love cheering others up. Also these dogs undergo a long period of obedience training and then are screened carefully for traits that they react favorably to humans and other animals. These animals help to provide affection and comfort to people in hospitals, retirement homes, nursing homes, schools, hospices, disaster areas, and people with learning abilities. Inside the therapy part of service animals there are three subgroups: therapeutic visitation, animal assisted therapy, and facilitated