Weird situation this week. We have a patient in with a seizures. She and her spouse insisted that her dog was a service dog and needed to stay with her. Apparently it barks when she is about to have a seizure.
She got a private room and her husband stays with her almost always. He does leave some to get food, I'm assuming to go home and take care of some things. Not sure if he works.
Well, when he leaves, he usually takes the dog with him..????? Now he does take the dog out to potty on occassion, but both days I had this patient, he left for several hours with dog. Plus, whenever I'm in the room, the dog is with husband, not with patient????
It has barked a few times, but when we go in there, it is at people who it didn't know...dietary, housekeeping, etc.
It's a small dog - chihuahua/dauchstand mix and very well behaved. I just think the family is getting away something here. I've been told it has all of its papers, etc.
I know that pet therapy is common and that they use service dogs for more than just blindness now, but has anyone heard of this?
This is a med surg/telemetry floor. The patient is on telemetry, so if she started to have a seizure, the monitors should alert us.
I had a patient once who had a daily visitor with a service dog. She was in a wheelchair and the dog would help pull the chair, open doors, etc. They treated this dog like a service dog...as in we shouldn't pet him when he's on duty etc. This couple from this week just doesn't behave like this.
The dog isn't really doing any harm and it is cute and well behaved, but something just seems....I don't know....fishy about this.
It really doesn't much matter what we think. According to federal law, a business owner(including hospitals) are allowed to ask about the pet but cannot ask the owner for any papers to prove the dog is a service animal.
It really doesn't much matter what we think. According to federal law, a business owner(including hospitals) are allowed to ask about the pet but cannot ask the owner for any papers to prove the dog is a service animal.
for the op's situation, yes.....but since then the question came up about letting dogs on a unit to visit the owner.
legally, guide dogs, service dogs and other service animals, aren't subject to the same laws as pet dogs and other animals. they may accompany their humans inside stores, buildings, restaurants, etc. so it becomes a nonissue.
legally, guide dogs, service dogs and other service animals, aren't subject to the same laws as pet dogs and other animals. they may accompany their humans inside stores, buildings, restaurants, etc. so it becomes a nonissue.
kathy
shar pei mom:paw::paw:
not sure who's disputing that.
what was also asked during this thread was folks feelings about non-service dogs coming on the floor to visit with a patient.
legally, guide dogs, service dogs and other service animals, aren't subject to the same laws as pet dogs and other animals. they may accompany their humans inside stores, buildings, restaurants, etc. so it becomes a nonissue.
kathy
shar pei mom:paw::paw:
but aren't they also registered and need to show their registration? otherwise any well behaved companion animal becomes a service animal.
There are Canine Good Citizenship classes put on through the American Kennel Club, that are disigned to train dogs to visit in LTC, and hospitals. If the animal is trained and clean then sure why not, problem is if the animal is not trained and suddenly becomes aggressive.
Working in the ED we have several people who bring their pets with them to the ED, and they are told if it is a working animal for a physical disabiliy no problem, but many many people have "service dogs" because they are lonely and just want the compainship, and those dogs are not allowed to the back and need to stay in the waiting room, but it is the ED and we generally only allow 1-2 people back with the patient anyways.
they must be registered but are not required to show their papers every single time they go in somewhere. proper service and guide animals wear special vests and service patches so they are
immediately identifiable on sight. some persons say their dogs are service dogs when they have no special training, certification, aren't registered, and do not wear the vest and patch.
i am severely disabled and our dog will sometimes bring me things, like my cell phone or the newspaper etc., but he isn't a service dog, hasn't had the training, and doesn't wear a vest. sometimes people just don't understand that their helpful loving dogs aren't service dogs in the correct sense of the word.
our dog was our beloved puppy when i became disabled six and a half years ago, and is still our spoiled beloved baby and pet. nothing about that has changed just because i have.
It is hard to understand why patients do what they do. Mostly, it sounds like the people are quiet and reasonable in this situation. As long as no one is being harmed, I would let it go. The woman gets comfort from the dog or maybe the husband does. No doubt her being hospitalized is stressful for this couple. Yup, it may be fishy or odd to you.
Someone else's world does not always make sense to any of us. For example, why do you want a guy who just got out of jail for assaulting to you to visit you? I have had this situation several times with patients. I will take the quiet dog visitor anytime. There are bigger mountains to climb. Worry about a Great Dane visiting when it happens if it ever does.
requirements and regulations for service dogs differ slightly from those for seeing eye and hearing dogs because their duties differ.
kathy
shar pei mom:paw::paw:
shar pei mom has the best suggestion:up::up::up:....look at this site for registering a service dog. they do not need to have paper work or identification. there are strict rules about service dog mandated by law. you may not even ask what tasks the dog does for its owner, it stipulates furhter that if the dog not dangerous you may not ask them to leave. are these people working the system:confused:.......maybe....but saying anything may get you and the facility in trouble for violating the patients rights and not accomodating a disabled person and their service animal...first and foremost educate yourself....look up the law....know your hospitals policy.....let the higher ups make the call.....talk this over with your manager in private! that being said...i worked at a hospital that allowed pet visits. they had rules but animals were welcome noon til 2 and 4 to 6. the anmals had to have proof of immunizations,clean,flea free ect....leashed or crated (ferrets and chinchillas welcome)....reptiles or birds in a designated area... .no lions, tigers, or bears:confused: and yes it did stipulate that.. pedi had no dogs policy but had their own spot too. a doctor once wrote "dog to visit stat":lol2: and once at another hospital had a minature fallabella pony visit. i will tell you...more hospitals should accomodate this train of thought. the benefit to the patients cannot be measured! besides it was fun on rounds to see all the animals and interact with the patients at their happiest time of the day.:redbeathe
Well I really dislike the sense of entitlement parents of children seem to have lately, what's with the idea that eeryone should have to put up with their little "gem"? Since it is perfectly acceptable for a 5 year old to come on a locked psychiatric ward to visit Mom during her latest Axis II self-harm episode then I don't see any reason why this patient shouldn't be allowed to have her dog visit. Personally I'd much rather 4 legged kids on my unit than the 2 legged ones any day.
I get that you are being sarcastic (at least I hope) by equating dogs with kids. (I know, I know. Some people love their dogs as much as children....whatever).
But I totally agree about the entitlement issue. I guess it's ok to bring big brother or sister to visit mommy in the hospital if she just had a baby or something, but a psych ward? That's ridiculous. I can't stand when people bring toddlers into the ICU to visit grandma and a) let them crawl around on the floor (gross!) or b)don't understand when they FREAK OUT to see 1000 tubes coming out of grandma/grandpa/mom/dad/long lost neighbor they just HAD to visit... Not to mention the germs the kids either bring in or pick up.
99% of the time a hospital is not an appropriate place for kids under 12 or so. IMO
The dog thing...(sorry, got off topic) I dunno. Yeah, I doubt this is a real service animal. On one had I don't see it as a problem if the dog is well behaved and staff is not expected to care for it. BUT I have severe allergies myself and can really feel for those with dog allergies that would be affected by this. There are reasons you can't take non service dogs just anywhere just becuse you feel like it. It seems like the hospital woud especially be one of those places. It also seems like the patient and her husband should be the ones to be thoughful of such things, but since they are not, it is just one of those things you are going to have to grit your tongue and deal with. God knows management is not going to want to get an ugly letter of bad survey score over this issue!
If it is a therapy dog then they have papers. Does your supervisor know about this? Then they should ask to see the papers. If they are getting away with this it is not fair. Everybody would have their pets in the hospital. This isn't the Hilton people, no you can not place reservations and no we don't have a "pet fee" policy.
We have a couple of regular patients with therapy dogs. We nurses take care of the dogs while the patient is on the floor.
Most of the dogs are trained therapy dogs. We have one regular, a homeless guy, who simply has a pet dog that is his constant companion and does in fact recognize when he will have a seizure. I hear that a local vet provides free care for her (though we have absolutely no papers to confirm anything), and she is very well behaved. If she were not allowed to stay with him while he was hospitalized, I don't know what she would do. I guess we'd have animal control pick her up...but that is several miles away and I don't know how he would get her once he left. I think it would about kill him to have her taken from him.
We don't ask for any documentation; we just let them bring their dogs. If there were a problem, we would probably require documentation, I suppose. I'm glad that, with all the other regulations and rules our administrators make, that they don't make a big deal about the "service" dogs, be they true service dogs or a simply an important companion. The dogs have all been very well behaved, very quiet, and no trouble at all. We have mostly private rooms anyway, and the dogs simply stay with their owner in the room with the door closed.
We once had a woman who insisted her pet birds were therapy birds. We let her bring them in, but kept her in a negative air room, and we wouldn't let her allow them to fly around the room (which she really wanted to do). I thought our CNS and supervisors were going to blow a gasket over the situation...it was pretty funny, particularly when the one bird kept telling our CNS to "shut up." We still give her a hard time about that!
:up:
i will tell you...more hospitals should accomodate this train of thought. the benefit to the patients cannot be measured! besides it was fun on rounds to see all the animals and interact with the patients at their happiest time of the day.:redbeathe
mustlovepoodles, RN
1,041 Posts
It really doesn't much matter what we think. According to federal law, a business owner(including hospitals) are allowed to ask about the pet but cannot ask the owner for any papers to prove the dog is a service animal.
http://www.ada.gov/svcanimb.htm