What Goes Into Turning a Regular Dog Into a Therapy Dog?

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The role of a dog in reducing stress and tension is undebatable. Numerous researches have established that people who own dogs are happier and more relaxed as they experience more emotions compared to others. Experiments have been conducted upon patients of problems such as depression and positive results were found patients were in the company of dogs.The role of a Therapy dog is exactly this- to make people who are going through serious mental or emotional crises and issues to feel better and recover faster. A therapy dog is not a pet that is use to do tricks for you, or as a guard dog or as a service dogs. While service dogs too are used to help people, these dogs are trained to be more of physical help like fetching things for the elderly.Therapy dogs don’t do any this. Instead, they are only intended for people who are feeling low due to mental or medical issues to cheer up. These dogs are affectionate, warm and display very caring qualities, which can have therapeutic effects on patients.

Whether or not a dog can be a therapy dog does not depend so much on its breed as on its temperament. As such, if you know that your dog is unusually affectionate, is friendly, does notbark at visitors and shows an unusual level of understanding and care, then your dog may have the right temperament to be a therapy dog.Your dog will have to be checked by an expert to see whether or not it is suitable to be a therapy dog. These examinations are necessary in order to avoid any ugly events with the patients, which could hurt them more. Ideally, your dog will be checked to see if he shows fear of strangers, aggression, sickness, fear of noises, reaction to sudden stimuli and others. Dogs that are needed for therapy have to be very docile, loving, and show an unusual level of calmness and patience.In order to be able to officially take your dog on therapy rounds, your dog needs to have a certification from a recognized body.

Training a dog in the appropriate way to make them fully functional as therapy dogs is not an easy task. The training here is to tune the emotions and temperament of the dogs, not just to teach them physical tricks. Such kind of training requires special attention by experts. You can try a few basic techniques yourself to turn your pet into a dog that brings joy and life to people who need that kind of attention by socializing your dog with people slowly, and steadily.For more information and guidelines, contact

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