Why can't I take my dogs to hospital?!!!

rockhillmanor wrote:

Executive wrote:
Simply ask your nurse if they can visit you during visiting hours. Unless they're Great Danes or Mastiffs, often they will allow visits....ask..worse they can say is no....Dennis

:B

Great Danes ARE allowed if they are TD dogs.

All my Great Danes had TD training/titles. For years we went to local hospitals to visit the cancer patients.
http://www.akc.org/events/title-recognition-program/therapy/

This is a case of size does not matter!:W

Get all your dogs certified ahead of time. They do not have to be akc registered and/or purebred. So if you do get sick they CAN come to the hospital and visit you.

Not to mention how gratifying it is to take your dogs to the hospital to help others.

Thanks for the link.
My wife has talked about using our dog as a therapy dog for some time.
Now that she's retired she has the time. (Wife, not the dog :))

Hi! I am the OP and thank goodness back home from surgery!!! No I didn't ask nor try to sneak any of the furbabies in but I did miss them.

I really felt sorry for my DH. One of our dogs is very attached to me so at night she really whined!!

It is great to be back home and have them on the sofa with me!

colliehauler wrote:
While not a hospital I use to take a Collie to a nursing home to visit a friend that had alzheimers. The other resident's loved a chance to pet him as well. You could see their eyes light up when I came for a visit.

I used to take Ike, my Aussie, to visit my Grandma. It took FOREVER to get to her room, because we stopped and talked with everyone along the way....LOL! And it was sort of odd - Ike was always stand-offish with strangers, but he LOVED the old folks, and would lay his head in their laps to be petted?! Either he understood how desperately they missed their pets, or he simply trusted them because they moved kind of slow.... but it was highly out-of-character on Ike's part.

The staff at the home encouraged pet visits by offering treats at the front office :-) They didn't know MY name, but they sure knew Ike :-)

:) Hi, not at the hospital, but Dusty was allowed to visit his/my Dad at the nursing home.

The local hospital will allow pet visits. You have to have proof of rabies vaccination and the dog/cat must be a good citizen at all times. All animals are subject to removal at the staffs discretion.

We took Mom's Boston in to see her after bypass surgery and her state of mind improved dramatically.

Two of the local nursing homes have resident dogs.

Deb and Ed M wrote:
Actually - Dr Doug - I was thinking the best reason to NOT take your dog to the hospital for a visit is because they can "catch" something (or bring home a nice virus to be shared with the rest of the family) ;-)

I agree with Nabi - there's a lot of therapy that happens with animals and humans. I used to be a docent with our local zoo and took gentle "wild animals" to visit schools for children with impaired cognition. Of course, I didn't know the background of the children I was dealing with - but everyone gasped when one boy with severe autism, stopped his head-nodding to look at, and stroke, the skunk I had shown him. It seems he had NEVER reacted to anything in the past? And I could write for hours about the benefit of horseback riding for kids and adults....

Deb and Ed there's no question that special needs children make a connection with pets. I know a person that has a downs syndrome child and one of the first words she spoke was (Dog).

When I was in a hospital in Bradenton, Florida two years ago I was on my fourth day there after surgery, I was missing my Lucy & Bubba so much.
The nurse told me if we had their vaccination papers that they could come in for a visit, I told her if I was there on the fifth day I would do that.
Next morning they told me they were sending me home later that day. Yay!!!
But I would have had to see them if I wasn't going home.

Sher

While not a hospital I use to take a Collie to a nursing home to visit a friend that had alzheimers. The other resident's loved a chance to pet him as well. You could see their eyes light up when I came for a visit.

I would have loved to have seen, 'The Wees' during my last hospital stay. I love the story about the child with Autism reacting to the skunk. Such sweet animals!!!

Actually - Dr Doug - I was thinking the best reason to NOT take your dog to the hospital for a visit is because they can "catch" something (or bring home a nice virus to be shared with the rest of the family) ;-)

I agree with Nabi - there's a lot of therapy that happens with animals and humans. I used to be a docent with our local zoo and took gentle "wild animals" to visit schools for children with impaired cognition. Of course, I didn't know the background of the children I was dealing with - but everyone gasped when one boy with severe autism, stopped his head-nodding to look at, and stroke, the skunk I had shown him. It seems he had NEVER reacted to anything in the past? And I could write for hours about the benefit of horseback riding for kids and adults....