For many individuals with mental health or behavioral disorders, going about a daily routine and meeting regular obligations can be a struggle. Psychiatric service dogs can help an individual with these tasks and will bring a number of benefits to a person that allows them to mitigate their disability symptoms, including preventing them from engaging in actions such as self-harm.
When combined with other forms of treatments, such as appropriate medication and therapy, a psychiatric service dog can greatly improve an individual’s life.
Below, we will be discussing what makes a psychiatric service dog unique from other types of service and support animals. Then, we will be giving you all the information you need about the tasks a psychiatric service dog can perform in order to prevent instances of self-harm and reduce the symptoms of any accompanying mental health issue.
Though psychiatric service dogs (PSD) and emotional support animals (ESA) are often thought of as the same thing, these types of service animals are actually quite different in several essential ways. Most importantly, the legal protections that PSDs are granted are different from those given to ESAs.
For example, no category of emotional support animal is covered by the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and they do not have the same public access rights as a psychiatric service dog or a traditional service animal (such as a guide dog or a medical assistance dog).
The ADA defines a service animal as one that is “individually trained to do work or perform tasks for the benefit of an individual with a disability, including a physical, sensory, psychiatric, intellectual, or other mental disability.” For those with mental health or behavioral disabilities, these tasks include preventing self-harming behaviors, retrieving medications and phones, calming down symptoms of anxiety, depression, or PTSD, and providing a sense of comfort and safety.
It is also important to note that the main difference between a psychiatric service dog and an emotional support animal is that an ESA only provides comfort and companionship; they are not trained to perform tasks for their owner or to mitigate specific symptoms of a disability or medical condition like a psychiatric service dog is.
Self-harming behaviors consist of causing deliberate harm or destruction to the body as a way to cope with intense emotional pain, frustration, anger, or depression. In most cases, self-harming behavior is not a suicide attempt, but it can have serious or fatal consequences when left untreated.
After engaging in self-harm, a person may have a sense of relief, but this will often be pushed out of the way for feelings of guilt, shame, and the emotions that caused the self-harm in the first place; it is easy for the cycle of self-harm to become an addictive behavior because of this.
Additionally, self-harm usually takes place as a symptom that is part of an overarching mental health condition such as anxiety, depression, borderline personality disorder, bipolar disorder, or an eating disorder.
A psychiatric service dog can help with self-harm as they will be taught to place their body in between their owner and whatever they are holding if they sense that self-injurious behaviors are about to take place. The dog may also put their body, paw, or head on their owner as a way to preventing them from scratching or hitting at themselves.
In certain cases, the PSD can be taught to present items to owners such as toys, brushes, or leashes when they witness self-harming behaviors as a way to redirect the owner’s attention and engage them in a more positive activity.
Because self-harming behaviors are often part of an overarching mental health or behavioral disability, it is important to learn about the other tasks a PSD can perform that may help calm their owners and reduce instances of self-harm.
Individuals who have specific mental health conditions such as anxiety, depression, or PTSD may find themselves stuck in states of high emotions and unable to relax and refocus their minds. A PSD can help with this by grounding their owners and providing a sense of stability.
The dog may also lay their body on the owner as a part of Deep Pressure Therapy, which helps to calm down meltdowns, panic attacks, and heightened emotional states.
When an owner is having a panic attack, depressed mood, manic state, or begins trying to engage in self-harming behaviors, a psychiatric service dog can be trained to bring emergency medications and water to their owner.
They may also be taught to bring medication on a routine schedule which can help the owner maintain a regular dosage of their medications and prevent extreme symptoms from occurring in the first place.
If an owner is experiencing symptoms of their disability in public, a psychiatric service dog can pick up on this and lead the owner to a quiet place. This can help the owner calm down privately and allow the PSD to perform any necessary comforting tasks that allow the owner to recover.
In the case of a medical emergency or a non-responsive owner, a PSD can be trained to call for emergency help or to lead first responders to their owner. This is especially helpful if the owner is unconscious in a more hidden place.
Even though psychiatric service dogs are trained to perform specific disability-related tasks, they can also provide comfort and companionship just by accompanying their owner on a daily basis.
The owner may have increased feelings of calm and lower levels of anxiety or fear when traveling with their PSD, and the constant comfort at home may help to prevent the ideation of self-injurious behaviors.
Before you can receive a psychiatric service dog to help prevent and control self-harming behaviors or other related mental health conditions, you must meet a few qualifications.
Most importantly, your mental health condition must cause a significant impairment to your life and must interfere with your abilities to operate on a daily basis. If this is not the case for you, you may want to consider adopting an emotional support animal instead of trying to secure a PSD for your condition.
Additionally, you will need to be able to provide any psychiatric service dog that you adopt with a stable home environment. You will also need to be able to command and properly care for the PSD (including affording regular veterinary visits) and must participate in part of the service dog’s training process.
Some organizations that place psychiatric service dogs may require slightly different things before you are able to adopt a dog. The best way to find out if you qualify for a PSD is to reach out to local and national organizations directly to inquire.
You will also need to speak with your doctor or a mental health professional about your goals to adopt a PSD and how you believe it will benefit you; a licensed professional may be able to help point you in the correction direction of service animal adoption
Experiencing a disability that interferes with daily life and makes it hard for an individual to maintain a normal routine is a highly stressful thing. The addition of a psychiatric service dog into a treatment plan can help improve an owner’s quality of life and will be able to help prevent self-harming behaviors in addition to relieving many other symptoms of a mental health condition.
If you believe that you can benefit from a PSD, your first steps are to reach out to your doctor or therapist and discuss your thoughts. From there, you can get started on your journey to receiving the help you need and finding some relief from your disability.