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Service dogs have helped veterans find relief from the symptoms of PTSD.
Chief Master Sgt. Richard Simonsen has been fighting anxiety, depression, and memory loss ever since he returned home from Afghanistan. Along with many other veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan, he suffers from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and Traumatic Brain Injury.
As part of an experimental program, Simonsen received a service dog, Yoko, from Paws for Wounded Warriors to help him battle the symptoms of his mental disorders. Training dogs to serve veterans with PTSD and TBI is a growing movement in the US.
According to an article in the American Journal of Public Health, about 20% of all returning veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan have been diagnosed with PTSD.
Raymond Galmiche, a Vietnam veteran, was diagnosed with PTSD in 2002. For years he had nightmares about his deployments. He attended counseling sessions, but he did not get any sort of relief until he was given Dazzle, his service dog, in September of 2011.
Like all service dogs, Yoko and Dazzle have been trained to respond to the needs of their companions. If Raymond is having a nightmare, Dazzle will lick his face and tap a paw on his chest.
“It blew me away,” Raymond told NBC News. “I can talk with just about any social worker, counselor, my closest friend, a psychologist, and as much as they can get it… the dog looks in my eyes and seems to understand what my real basic need is.”
For a veteran who has had to remain vigilant when overseas, not knowing who or what can lurk around the corner can cause a lot of anxiety. PTSD service dogs are also trained to give comfort to the veteran when out in public.
If a veteran is feeling anxious about entering a space that is unknown, the dog will explore the area and come back, indicating to its companion that the trip is safe. If the veteran feels overcrowded, the service dog is able to provide a buffer, creating distance between the veteran and a group.
Research on the benefits of service dogs for PTSD patients is lacking, and there also is no consensus or accepted standard for these training dogs.
A VA hospital in Tampa, Fla. is conducting a three-year long study with 17 veterans to provide empirical data showing what benefits might exist for PTSD and TBI patients.
The Research Center for Human-Animal Interaction (ReCHAI) at the University of Missouri (MU) is also conducting its own research. They will soon begin their second session. The aim of the research differs from that of the hospital in Tampa and is conducted in three phases.
Veterans are paired up with shelter dogs to give them obedience training twice a week. Behavior is the number one reason why shelter dogs are returned but the point of the study is “to give the veterans constructive, helpful activity for them to engage in, which is a chance for them to relax and have some stress reduction,” said Dr. Rebecca Johnson, director of ReCHAI.
The second phase consists of veterans calling families that have adopted the shelter dogs that were trained. Finally, for the third phase the dogs being trained are observed for traits that would make them good service dogs. These dogs are then given further training by specialized trainers until they are placed with a veteran. All the while the veterans complete self-reports about the training sessions and their experiences of the various phases.
Hopefully, the research being done by the VA and universities like MU will help better the process by which PTSD patients receive service dogs. No matter the results of the studies, Chief Master Sgt. Richard Simonsen and Raymond Galmiche are proof that many returning veterans benefit from service dogs.
“I think there are more veterans out there, whether they are on active duty or not, who would benefit from at least time with dogs,” Simonson told Voice of America.
Photo courtesy AN HONORABLE GERMAN on Flickr.
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13 Comments
My lab, Cooper may not be a trained service dog but he knows when I need his help and has been there for me on many occasions. He rubs his nose up under my armpit when he notices that I’m having a nightmare or am upset. This is great news.
I hope at some point, once all Veterans receive service animals, that I can have one, also.
Just get one at a shelter. They just somehow know what to do.
I am not a Veteran. I was given a dog that is a shepard/pitbull mix, he knows when I am about to have a seizure and will begin to lick me in the face to stay conscious. Even though I don’t like him bothering me it is a relief that he is there for me until someone is able to get to me. I wouldn’t trade him for anything, even though he is still young & can be a pain. I still really appreciate him.
We my daughter was 3 we had a lab mix, that I didn’t connect with to well. It was sad that shortly after she got a blood infection that she developed epilepsy. When I came home from work one evening I was meant by my Mom at the door telling me that we needed to talk. We always made it a Family decision about our Family pets. I went into the room that she laid in and laid on the ground with her. I looked into her eyes and was talking to her calmly, I saw what was about to happen and told my Sister to get my Daughter out of the room and shut the door, I knew what was coming just from her pupils. I laid there with her until she stopped from the second one. I came out of the room and told them we need to go to the Vet. She was a dog that was rescued off the streets and we adopted her. I didn’t appreciate her before I found something I could relate to her with. It really took a toll on me from the moment I saw her having a grand-mal to the drive to the Emergency Vet. I wanted more time with her to bond with our illness. But I also knew that it was her time & she didn’t need to suffer no more. Mom had to stay in the room with her as she was put down, I couldn’t do it. I still remember her as the healthy 3 year old dog that we picked out at the shelter that our main Vet had.
So save a life and pick a dog from a Shelter, all aged dogs need to be loved and appreciated before it is too late for them. I’m just glad Shadow had 4 wonderful years with us outside of a cage. Any breed is a good breed, PLEASE ADOPT.
Thank you for speaking up and wrtniig your story. I am currently looking to start or to join a support group for spouses living with a spouse with PTSD. Thank you for mentioning the secondary PTSD. You dont know these things unless others speak out and there is such a huge need for help for all of us spouses dealing with our own form of WAR.
I’m 65 with a 70% service connected for PTSD from Vietnam. I conducted critical incident debriefings for seven years for the forest service and general public. I trained my German Shepard as a service dog and he was magic when dealing with 20 to 100 firefighters who had been involved in a burn over. He broke the ice and allowed everyone to open up. When I was depressed he would sense it and drop a ball in my lap as if to say, “lighten up breeze, lets play ball”. He was magic.
They seem to sense when someone is down, to get their mind off of it and distract them with something more entertaining. My Dad is a Vietnam Vet and also suffers from PTSD. Animals are the best to cheer someone up from a thought, depression, flashback, or even when they are sick with an illness.
The offer from a local group of certified trainers for Service Dog International, volunteering to train PTSD and TBI dogs for only the cost of redeeming the dogs from shelters, was turned down by the (Portland, OR) VA. The trainers, however, are getting and training dogs anyway, and they will soon be available to Portland/Vancouver area vets. Contact: acwolph@gmail.com
I had to have a dog put down last year because of bone cancer but didn’t quite realize at the time that he was trying to help me all the while with my issues. He would come up to me and lay his head in my lap or on my arms like he wanted me to pet him but I always thought he just wanted attention. I never thought that it might have been for my own good as well. I just realized it when I had read the other comments. Thanks for the perspective guys.
We had to put a dog down that my Dad was extremely attached to & he still talks to her where we barred her on the property. But we received a new puppy that looks just like her except more white markings and she is just as nutty as the one that passed. But we named her Lady II after our recent passing Lady I. He feels that he can talk better to her then a Doctor and she helps him better then one as well. You don’t know what you really got until the Lord takes it away.
My Dad talks to our one dog that sleep in my Parents room. He says she is better then a Doctor, she is not a trained service dog. But she sure does know how to make him feel better and distract him from having flashbacks.
I´m not a vet but was diagnosed with PTSD as bad as the worst of the vets that came out of Vietnam. My doctors suggested I get with a group of vets when they talked as a group though they felt they would never allow this. My PTSD is a result of ritual and racist child abuse combined with a doctor who experimented on me when I was very young. I´m on meds of the anxiety but what helps most are our two lovable dogs. Our first is a maltese-terrier dalmation mix and she alerts to my epileptic seizures. When we got her she began sensing when a seizure was coming on and would sort of walk in front of me to get me to sit down. Then she´d lay beside me. This helped because it eased my worries and allowed me to relax. I felt protected by her and well cared for. She is 11 years old now and still does this. Our other dog is a Brussels Griffon and he has been a God send for my husband who is a veteran in special forces, multi-forces joint training program. He was in the very first class. So, in his sleep he lobs grenades as our dogs sit and watch. His flashbacks of hand to hand combat and martial arts fights are scary for me but he´s trained me in what to do, mainly don´t touch him, and our dogs remain very still and quiet as if they know instinctively. I´ve trained my husband what to do if I sleep walk, talk or scream in my sleep. My doctors trained me very well and our dogs come to me when I need their comfort most. I was told by my doctors that of all the vets with the level of ptsd that I have, none were functioning in society, all were in locked wards in va hospitals and some had been catatonic for years. They wanted to know how I could´ve survived what I did as a child let alone be able to function and hold down a job. I had only one answer and that was answered prayer, my faith in God. Our dogs come to me when I am encountering severe headaches as well. Before memories resurface my head hurts in a very specific way. It may take weeks, months or years for them to break through and then I must deal with them. My husband´s military training comes in handly for me because he used to command troops and when they had trouble dealing with something he knew how to calm them and get them back up and going again. To help me he even got his certification in Hypnotherapy for the usual things but mainly for pain management. Mind over matter works great when using biofeedback as well which I´ve been able to experience a couple of times. Having been in marching and concert bands I noticed how music could order my mind in such a way as to help me get back on track before a seizure to lessen it´s affects. Self-hypnosis has also helped tremendously and allows me to deal lucidly with problems in my mind which is a more stress free environment than the world outside my mind. My son was diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactive disorder and epilepsy and it was because I realized how music, pets and self-hypnosis could help he got a better leg up in life than he would´ve if he hadn´t had these things. I shared these things with both our doctors and they began experimenting with them as new alternatives. They worked for us and may work for other people as well.
I live in Indiana currently thankfully there are dogs next door that help improve my mood every time I play with them. Wish I could have my own, but living with my Aunt& Uncle,mother, and my wife.So there is no room for me to have a dog of my own.
Still wish there was more service dogs for the other Vets.
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