Steps To Getting A Psychiatric Service Dog

Veronica morris shares her succinct breakdown of the path for a person with a disability to become a service dog user.

Steps to getting a psychiatric service dog. There are several ways that a psychiatric service dog can aid in relieving the symptoms of anxiety or depression in people including. Their potential psychiatric service dog in training begins the public access and task training specific to that individuals symptoms diagnosis and needs. Where can you get a psychiatric service dog. Psychiatric service dog a psychiatric service dog is simply a service dog for a person with a psychiatric impairment like post traumatic stress disorder ptsd.

Formal training for a service dog usually lasts about 2 years before they are placed with their owner but you will need to work with the dog for up to an hour a day for at least a 30 day trial period to help the dog to adjust to your individual needs. Service dogs for america requires the applicant be at least 12 years old participate in an interview with one of their sda representatives and be able to provide financial proof that he can afford a service dog. To qualify for a service animal all you need to do is get written documentation from your healthcare provider that you have and are being treated for an emotional or psychiatric disorder or disability and require the assistance of an. 10 traits of successful psychiatric service dog users.

Talk with other service dog owners about the pros and cons of living with a service dog reading psdp s answers to common questions for more information. Steps to become a service dog user dr. Step 1 train your dog to provide a psychiatric service dog task your psd can be trained to perform a number of different tasks we touched on some of these earlier and it is dependant on your individual needs. We also train our dogs tasks that mitigate the symptoms of their handler s illness.

3 commit to caring for your service dog s needs. The most common tasks the psychiatric service dog performs are. These dogs are individually trained in obedience performing tasks and working in distracting public environments to mitigate their handler s psychiatric disability.