Knoxville Magazine February 2010 : Page 35
sensory deprivation disorder. “He can’t tell when he is sick or hurt,” Hall ex- plains. “His big Black Labrador, Goli- ath, had been nudging him in the groin. His mother was working with Tiffany to alleviate Goliath’s troubling new be- havior, but nothing was working. One night, Mark ended up in the hospital with an urinary tract infection so bad that it had gone to his kidneys. Goliath was trying to tell us that Mark was sick!” Hall says the dogs become “mem- bers of the family” but should not be considered pets in the conventional sense of the word. “Turning a service dog into a pet diminishes, even elimi- nates, his ability to work with the child. Pets are therapeutic in many ways, but being a service dog requires that they work as service dogs.” There is no preference for a specific breed or gender but a walk-through of the tidy facility reveals a high propor- tion of Golden Retrievers, the breed so aptly known for its winning nature and “smile.” Dr. Ariane Schratter said her Mary- ville College team has documented im- provement in children within a week of pairing with a dog. She calls the child/ dog connection the “it” factor of the study. “The dog is well prepared to re- spond to the individual child’s idiosyn- cratic behaviors, and the response from the dog will be regular, predictable and immediate. That consistency in the dog’s behavior is probably an important aspect of the apparent benefits.” Perhaps author George Eliot sum- med it up when she observed, “We long for an affection altogether ignorant of our faults. Heaven has accorded this to usin the uncritical canine attachment.” To Volunteer: Wilderwood Service Dogs needs volunteers to help with early dog training exercises. For additional information, go to wilderwood. org or call 865.660.0095 or email: wilderwood@charter.net. For the latest research into autism, visit naar.org/research/ research.asp Wilderwood Service Dogs was re- cently chosen to provide a dog for a child whose family is being featured on Pen- nington’s ExtremeHomeMakeover. www.knoxmag.com FEBRUARY 2009 35
