Training A Medical Alert Dog (Service Dogs)

Medical Detection and Alert Dogs use their incredible noses to sense bio-chemical changes in your body. Every change has an attached smell. If we can isolate that smell, we can train your dog to detect it, alert you to its presence and help you reduce the effects of whatever condition is causing it.

A trained service animal can save your life. Whether it's by catching a whiff of nuts that could kill a person with a severe airborne allergy, detecting low blood sugar, or even recognizing heart abnormalities that could signal a heart attack, the incredibly sensitive canine sense of smell can work wonders.

Medical alert dogs can warn their owners about impending crisis situations in a variety of illnesses. These include diabetes, heart disease, airborne allergies, asthma, illnesses that cause dizziness or potential loss of consciousness when standing, and many others. And whether or not the animal detects the emergency in advance, they can provide a quick, targeted medical response unique to the individual's needs.

It is the TRAINED TASK the dog performs that makes it a service dog. And that task MUST be something the dog does for the disabled person that makes his disability not so disabling. It must mitigate the disability and it must be a task that helps the person function in public. If the task is only performed in the privacy of the owners own residence it is not a qualifying task for service dog classification.

This book will assist you in training a task that helps with your disability.