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<\/p>\nFor years,\u00a0service dogs\u00a0have been helping people with disabilities. Now they\u2019re being trained to assist people in the early stages of memory loss.<\/p>\n
The first-ever \u201cdementia dogs\u201d \u2013 a\u00a0Golden Retriever\u00a0named Oscar and a\u00a0Lab\u00a0named Kaspa, who are both 2 years old\u00a0\u2013 went to work four months ago in Scotland. The dogs were placed with people in early stages of dementia, who have a partner or full-time caregiver. Dementia dogs help their owners by reminding them of tasks like taking their medicine and getting out of bed in the morning.<\/p>\n
\u201cKaspa has given us our life back,\u201d Glenys Will, whose husband, Ken, was diagnosed with dementia three years ago, said on the\u00a0Dementia Dog\u00a0website.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe greets Ken in the morning, so [Ken starts his] day being happy. I have noticed if Ken is agitated or unsettled, Kaspa gives him a nudge so Ken talks to the dog or goes out to the back garden and forgets what had bothered him. \u2026 Who would believe a dog came into our lives two weeks ago and turned our lives around.\u201d<\/p>\n
Oscar\u2019s new owner, Maureen Benham, has also benefitted from having a dementia dog. She had previously avoided leaving the house because she had difficulty holding conversations. Now she, her husband, Frank, and Oscar go out for daily walks.<\/p>\n
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\u201cYou meet people in the street and it\u2019s a conversation starter, especially if Maureen knows them,\u201d Frank told\u00a0BBC News<\/a>. \u201cBefore we had the dog, I did get frustrated, but the dog acts as a buffer between you. If it works out and eventually, down the line, it will be a normal thing for people with Alzheimer\u2019s or dementia to have a dog, I think it will be a fantastic achievement.\u201d<\/p>\n The notion\u00a0of dementia dogs was brainstormed by students at the Glasgow School of Art. For a\u00a0Design Council\u00a0competition, they were asked to come up with innovative solutions to help people with dementia live well.<\/p>\n \u201cWe thought, why can\u2019t we train dogs to help people with dementia in the same way as we train dogs to help people who can\u2019t see?\u201d Luke McKinney, one of the students, told BBC News.<\/p>\n The students pitched their idea to\u00a0Alzheimer Scotland, the leading dementia organisation in that country. \u201cThe feedback we got was instantly huge,\u201d McKinney said.<\/p>\n Alzheimer Scotland,\u00a0Dogs for the Disabled\u00a0and\u00a0Guide Dogs Scotland\u00a0all joined forces to start the Dementia Dog project, and started looking for suitable dogs and people who needed them.<\/p>\n \u201cOscar was withdrawn from guide dog training and passed across to the Dementia Dog project, while Kaspa came straight off the Dogs for the Disabled socialization scheme after being specially selected for the project,\u201d according to the\u00a0Alzheimer Scotland\u00a0website.<\/p>\n \u201cBoth dogs have been highly trained to help offer practical assistance and help to reduce social isolation and anxiety levels, some of the major problems experienced by couples where one partner has dementia.\u201d<\/p>\n Funding for Oscar and Kaspa\u2019s 18 months of training was provided in part by the Design Council and the Scottish government.<\/p>\n Since the pilot project was so successful, two more\u00a0pups are now in training to become dementia dogs.<\/p>\n Dementia Dogs – Scotland<\/a><\/p>\n By Laura Goldman<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" For years,\u00a0service dogs\u00a0have been helping people with disabilities. Now they\u2019re being trained to assist people in the early stages of memory loss. The first-ever \u201cdementia dogs\u201d \u2013 a\u00a0Golden Retriever\u00a0named Oscar and a\u00a0Lab\u00a0named Kaspa, who are both 2 years old\u00a0\u2013 went to work four months ago in Scotland. The dogs were placed with people in early … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":3351,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[231,221],"class_list":["post-2761","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-animal-training","tag-caring-with-compassion","tag-dementia-dogs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/old.lonelypetsclub.com.au\/Blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2761","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/old.lonelypetsclub.com.au\/Blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/old.lonelypetsclub.com.au\/Blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/old.lonelypetsclub.com.au\/Blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/old.lonelypetsclub.com.au\/Blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2761"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/old.lonelypetsclub.com.au\/Blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2761\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3361,"href":"https:\/\/old.lonelypetsclub.com.au\/Blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2761\/revisions\/3361"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/old.lonelypetsclub.com.au\/Blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3351"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/old.lonelypetsclub.com.au\/Blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2761"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/old.lonelypetsclub.com.au\/Blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2761"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/old.lonelypetsclub.com.au\/Blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2761"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}